Jon1

Thanks ukrules, very helpful information! Seems like maybe it's best to avoid going for TE visa at this time.

2 hours ago, robblok said:

Not sure why the OP does not have this half year.. or his time difference was even bigger.

My membership expired on February.

1 hour ago, redpill17 said:

I think people are confusing visas and Immigration stamps/extensions.

 

Visa = permission to entry

Stamp = permission to stay

 

So if Immigration stamped you for 1 year, you can legally stay during this period, hence 6th year is possible. Obviously, Thailand Elite isn't happy when someone is getting extra time for free, but they have no power to void the entry stamp. That's my understanding.

 

For example, tourist visa is valid for ~90 days, but you can enter on the last day and still be eligible to stay for 60 days and then extend it for 30 more, even though visa would be expired. Why would the rules be different for Elite visa, unless there's special law regulating it? (which I'm not aware of) 

 

I don't know much about Non-Imm visas, so i'm curious: if someone gets a 1-year marriage extension, then gets divorced, can they still stay until stamp runs out?

This is exactly what I'm thinking about. If I buy a new membership and the membership is active, shouldn't I be able to extend the permission to stay even though TE visa is expired?

If someone has knowledge if there is some special law regulating TE visas and especially that the visa itself, not only the membership has to be valid for the period of extension, would be very interested to know.

I think this is something I'll try to find out with the immigration and TE office if I'm still going to try to stay in Thailand with TE visa at this time.

On 9/20/2020 at 6:10 AM, Mike Teavee said:

The only time immigration issue Visas is for conversions, MFA issue all New (I.e non-converted) Visas outside of Thailand.

 

Being on a now-expired TE Visa you cannot:

   - Renew, as the Visa has expired

   - Extend, as the Visa has expired 

   - Convert, as you’re already on one

Was thinking about this possible immigration reasoning again.

Isn't it the case anyway that immigration doesn't renew any kind of visas inside Thailand?

Also for the extension, isn't the extension always for the permission to stay, not for the actual visa, and you should be able to extend permission of stay even after the visa has expired?

I'm thinking if it would be possible to just get the TE permission to stay extended after the TE membership is approved. There shouldn't be any rule requiring a visa that's not expired on your passport to get an extension of stay? So in this way it wouldn't be a problem about the requirement to get the visa affixed at the airport. It would be possible to just stay on the permission of stay extension and get the visa to passport later when it's possible to travel again.

5 hours ago, YaiJung said:

I don't know how any of you with the five yr membership can be surprised at Thai Elite's response.  You have received multiple emails explaining and warning you that any permission to stay after your membership has expired will be invalid.  You also would have received multiple emails offering renewal at discounted rates, but you chose to attempt to weasel another yr for free out of your visa. 

 

When you sign up for thailand elite you are signing up to play by the rules of people in power who make the rules.  They override anything done by low level immigration staff.  Now you have annoyed them and are on their <deleted>list. 

 

My PE visa expired in Nov 2019, so I know all about the emails and warnings. 

 

Well the permission to stay is valid unlike they say and when they sold the visa in the beginning even Thailand Elite themselves told that you can get a one year permission to stay stamp near the visa expiration. So I don't know how is this any "weaseling" from the people who bought the membership with certain conditions in the beginning and then 5 years later TE changed their interpretation?

Probably not everyone saw that the country would be closed for the whole year in the beginning of the year. Also you would assume that paying TE 1-million THB would help. But I can say that I was honestly surprised to find out that they changed their policy of affixing visas inside Thailand for expired memberships during the covid situation.

9 hours ago, Mike Teavee said:

But the difference is you converted to a TE Visa from your ED Visa which is allowed in-country as long as your permission to stay has the minimum number of days remaining depending on the Visa you’re converting to (e.g. Non-O it’s 15 days, might be less for TE)

 

The only time immigration issue Visas is for conversions, MFA issue all New (I.e non-converted) Visas outside of Thailand.

 

Being on a now-expired TE Visa you cannot:

   - Renew, as the Visa has expired

   - Extend, as the Visa has expired 

   - Convert, as you’re already on one

... So the only option available to you if you want a TE is to get a new one for which you have to leave & come back in.

You would think/hope that they’d bend the rules a little given current circumstances but it could be that it would take a change to immigration law to allow immigration to issue a new Visa without it being the result of a conversion.

 

That's a good point and you're right that this might be their reasoning for not affixing the visa inside Thailand.

It's just that previously this wasn't a problem. There are multiple reports on Thaivisa that people were able to affix the visa inside Thailand with an expired membership and the latest one was from last month from Krey. Thailand Elite told me that this is a recent change for them. It is just crazy to start enforcing this now with the covid situation when you're not able to travel easily and even get back in the country.

58 minutes ago, Mike Teavee said:

No, you’re getting confused, the topic is about getting a new TE Visa after the old one has expired 

 

in the example you gave of getting a new 5 year Visa on the 20 Year membership the “Visa” itself hadn’t expired.

 

Need to separate the Visa element from the Permission to Stay... With TE you are trying to renew an expired Visa, which they’re saying immigration is telling them cannot be done in-country, with other Visas you are converting which Immigration allows you to do for any Visa type (including Visa Exempt) in-country as long as you have at least 15 days remaining on your PTS

 

Well originally when I received the TE visa at Bangkok immigration I only had an expired ED visa. So with the expired ED visa you can receive TE visa in-country but with expired TE visa you can't.

19 minutes ago, Mike Teavee said:

To the original topic it’s not really surprising that TE won’t support you “Renewing” a Visa that has expired up to 1 year before & there are no other Visas that can be renewed in-country so why would the TE be any different? 
 

Visa can be extended in-country (but you’re past the end of available extensions for the 5 yr TE Visa) & sometimes they can be converted from a different Visa class but going from expired TE to a new TE is neither so it makes sense to me that you have to leave & come back anew.

You don't extend the visa itself you extend the permission to stay. Even with 20-year Elite membership you just get 5-year visas affixed to your passport and you can get a new one attached at the immigration. They are just saying that they can't attach a new 5-year visa to your passport inside Thailand if your Elite membership has expired before even after you become a member again. For me this doesn't make sense. Also like written here before, they used to be able to do this just last month.

4 hours ago, richard_smith237 said:

For now, I’m curious. If someone on a Tourist Visa can purchase and switch to the EliteVisa without having to leave Thailand. Why can someone on a Non-Imm O visa not do the same?....  The answers from ThaiElite don’t quite stack up.

I actually did ask this at the Thailand Elite office. I was told that if I had a tourist visa I could get the Thailand Elite visa affixed to my passport without leaving the country. The whole situation is just laughable, with a tourist visa I could get the visa done inside country but because I was previously Thailand Elite member and the membership is expired I need to go out of country and come back to get the visa affixed to my passport.

6 hours ago, 4MyEgo said:

but as Krey has mentioned, same circumstances, now why is his being accepted and yours not, and is he paying any fee for renewal or does the Elite team get a mere renewal fee for processing it and not the commission if done outside the country, just asking.

 

I would be walking into immigration and asking questions, because I am sure they would have provided the Elite team with what their policy is with regard to accepting Elite visas, it might be that the applicant must be outside the country when applying, but what about when renewing, which is what you want to know, and if you ask me, I smell a rat.

 

Like I said, I know nothing about the Elite process, but you want to get to the bottom of it, because you should be able to renew it in house as all of us can renew our respective extensions in house, as for it having expired, well, I would have thought it's the stamp allowing you to stay is what matters ?  

The Elite staff told me that it is a recent change that those with expired membership can't renew the visa inside Thailand even when you have a valid permission to stay stamp. They said that this rule is from the immigration, but I have doubts about whether this is true. Pretty nice to make this change at this time when it's impossible to even come back to Thailand with a new elite membership. I was told that because of the expired membership I would be considered a new member and at the moment only old elite members can enter Thailand. And like I wrote before they were trying to claim that even with a valid stamp I'm on "overstay" because the membership is expired.

Krey I read your previous post about your situation. Your membership expired on February and you have a permission to stay until October, it's exactly the same as my situation. My membership also expired on February and I have a permission to stay until October.

But today I was told first on the phone and then at their office also that because a change of immigration regulations I can't get the Thailand Elite visa affixed inside Thailand.

I submitted the application and I'm willing to pay them but they still won't allow me to get the visa inside Thailand.

This is very strange as I was under the impression that immigration would allow you to extend or apply to some non-resident visas easier, but for the Elite they want to make it more difficult?

2 hours ago, FlyingThai said:

Is your permission of stay (entry stamp) still valid?

 

in that case you will not have any problem affixing a new visa from TE.

 

Not sure what suddenly got into them but in the past few months Thailand Elite transformed into a bunch of rude, arrogant Mofos who don't reply to emails and are extremely cocky on the phone. In the end I went to their office and ripped them a new one. Must be all the new free money, hope many of the poor sods haven't paid yet.

 

 

My permission to stay is valid until the end of October.

I even went to the Elite office after I called them. At the office also they were saying that because the membership is expired even though I have the permit to stay stamp the visa can't be affixed at the immigration but I have to fly out of the country and come back to affix the visa. I still submitted my new application just in case but they were very firm on me not being able to get an Elite visa affixed to passport inside Thailand. A funny thing is that I asked them would I be able to get the Elite visa affixed in Thailand if I had a tourist visa, and they informed me that with a tourist visa they would have no problem doing that.

They also told me that because my membership is expired I'm on overstay even though I have the Elite permission to stay stamp until end of October. Although when I asked them would I get overstay on my record when leaving the airport, they told me that I wouldn't get a record of overstay. Seems like the staff at Elite is just making up the rules of their own.

Somehow I'm thinking the affixing of visa is not a problem with the immigration but this is some kind of punishment from the Thailand Elite to members who have used their visa after the membership expired. Hopefully there is still some way to fix this. I think there must be some other previous Elite members in this same situation currently.

Also it is weird that they didn't want to reply about the new regulation in writing via email, they were only able to reply me through phone conversation.

Thanks for the reply Ubonjoe. This is indeed very weird. I called the sales office again, apparently the rude one was the sales manager. The other person I talked to was at least trying to be polite and helpful but of course he told me the same thing that can't get the visa affixed in Thailand if the membership is expired due to a new immigration regulation.

I think I will just try to do the application anyway but this isn't looking good now.

Also they said it was very strange that the immigration gave me a permission to stay stamp longer than the membership, even when I've read on this forum that this has been a standard procedure for everyone.

Anyone have a recent experience of renewing an expired Thailand Elite membership inside Thailand? I just called to Thailand Elite sales and staff who was speaking quite rudely told me that since my membership has expired I can't get the visa affixed to my passport inside Thailand because of some new regulations from the immigration. Is this really the case at the moment? Also the staff told me that for the expired membership the approval process would take 2-3 months now.

If you have old Thailand Elite membership for sale please send me pm with your offer.