Red Phoenix

If you expect/foresee that you will leave and re-enter Thailand at least 3 times during the 1-year that your 1-year extension of stay will provide you, then it makes sense to buy during your 1-year extension application a Multiple-Entry Re-Entry Permit, which costs 3.900,- THB. If you are not sure whether you will exit Thailand during your 1-year extension of stay (or would normally do it only once), it is recommended to simply buy a Single Use Re-Entry Permit (cost 1.000,- THB) when applying for your 1-year extension of stay. That way it is already taken care of in case you suddenly need to exit the country, or might want to do a land-border crossing.

I used the just recently launched ChatGPT service < https://aseannow.com/thaivisa-chatgpt/ > to answer the question for me whether you can apply for a 1-year extension for reason of marriage based on your original Non Imm O-A Visa. Below the answer I got within 2 seconds... Note that the last sentence provided by the Chatbot is not useful, as a Thai Embassy/Consulate would not be the right place to make the query, but rather it should be the Immigration Office of the province where you would be applying. But nonetheless quite impressive that it came up with the correct answer.

ChatGPT is a kind of SuperGoogle. And just like Google will provide you with links that fit the 'accepted narrative' and renders links that do not fit that bias at the end of the list (or don't show them at all), the same goes for ChatGPT. And it is NOT useful when quering about a controversial subject as you would only get a one-sided response from so-called 'trusted' sources (a bit like consulting Wikipedia, which is also heavily biased on subjects outside the mainstream). But ChatGPT can be quite useful for answering questions on neutral subjects. Especially if a search-engine does not answer your specific query, and it would force you to visit several sites to get the pieces of information that combined provide the answer. An example - if you typed the very specific question in a search-engine Which Thai royalty has burmese roots you would not get a clear-cut answer, but would have to open several of the links to find your answer. ChatGPT does this for you and immediately provides you with the answer: One of the Thai royalty who has Burmese roots is Queen Sirikit, the wife of the late King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand. Her maternal grandfather was a prince of Martaban, a town in southern Burma, which is now known as Myanmar. NOTE: Lazy students that need to write a paper on a specific subject will find ChatGPT very useful as it will compose an almost perfect summary based on the sources it has access to. Needless to say that such paper will not contain any 'original' idea of the student. And colleges/universities are increasingly worried about such recycling. Some very lazy students that handed 'their' paper in without making any changes have been 'catched' already. But if the student would use the ChatGPT composed paper as the back-ground for his own paper, it can help him not to overlook certain aspects and it would be possible to weave his original ideas in the paper co-authored by ChatGPT. These are certainly some interesting developments...

Yes, I was mistaken about the possibility of applying for an extension based on marriage (without the need for Thai Health Insurance) from your original Non Imm O-A Visa. But this is Thailand, so I wouldn't bet my life that every Imm Office in Thailand would allow such application. Hence - as always - it would be wise when considering that option to enquire beforehand at the Imm Office of the province where you are residing.

@Pib - Many thanks for crystal clear explanation about this issue. So that means that you could apply for the 1-year Non Imm O-A Visa in your home-country if you have foreign Health Insurance that meets the Non Imm O-A requirements. And then at the end of the 2-year period that Visa can provide you (without the need to park funds on a Thai bank-account), apply for the 1-year extension for reason of marriage. That's good news for those married to a Thai national (or have Thai dependant children) as it would avoid the need for subscribing to Thai Health Insurance, which is the main deterrent to apply for the Non Imm O-A Visa. Now of course if you are married to a Thai national or have Thai dependant children, you could also apply for the Non Imm O Visa for that reason in your home-country. But if you already have foreign (or Thai) Health Insurance that meets the Non Imm O-A requirements, applying for the Non Imm O-A Visa would be an attractive option to consider.

Yes indeed, that's sound logic. And the OP mentioned Khalasin Imm Office where they seemed to have followed that logic. Thanks!

If that is the case then logically Immigration should, when issuing a new Permit to stay, invalidate the Re-Entry Permit in your Passport which was based on the previous permit even if the expiry date has not passed yet. But thai logic... There is probably not a clear-cut practice on such issue, and will differ according to interpretation by the individual border immigration officer. So it would be best instead of risking your old Re-Entry Permit not being accepted, to simply buy a new one when you apply for your 1-year extension of stay.

I am not sure if I correctly understand what you mean, but I think you are talking about the following case: - Months ago you bought a Re-Entry Permit but did not use the Single One or your Re-Entry Permit is still valid (in case of a Multiple Entry one) for your current Permit to stay - You apply early for your annual extension (you can do it from 30 to 45 days before the current Permit to stay for your Visa/extensions expires) - And you receive a new Permit to stay valid for 1 year. In that case your new Permit to stay will make the older one (which might have still a month validity) obsolete. BUT your old not-used or still valid Re-Entry Permit of course mentions that old Permit to stay date, and it has not expired yet. In such case, it is not clear for me what would happen if you re-entered Thailand with that old Re-Entry Permit before its expiry date. But I presume that it would be honored (after all it has not expired yet) and that border Immigration would stamp you in for the new Permit to stay date. And it is obvious that you cannot expect border Immigration to stamp you in for that new Permit to stay date, when you re-enter with that old Re-Entry Permit if it is already past expiry date.

The Re-Entry Permit stamp in your Passport has a 'Valid until' date. And that 'valid until' date is same as the expiry date of the Permission to stay from the Visa/extension in your Passport at the moment you bought the Re-Entry Permit.

Oops... stupid mistake, must have been sleeping while responding - sorry for any confusion created!

Erroneous response so I deleted

When he stays at his friends farm, it is the FRIEND that is supposed to inform local Immigration that a foreigner is staying at their premises. And by doing so the friend would be able to provide him with a copy of the TM-30, which he needs if he wants to do his 30-day extension at the local Imm Office.

Hi dr Jack, That's interesting as I was totally unaware of that option. So I would be interested if you could provide me with a link to the official requirements where that option is addressed.

Just a question of interest > Will Immigration accept the TM-30 copy that he got early during his Thailand stay, when he applies for the 30-day extension a couple of weeks later?

Afaik you CANNOT apply for reason of marriage, when applying for the 1-year extension of your Non Imm O-A Visa. You can only apply for reason of marriage on a Non Imm O Visa. So when you want to apply for reason of marriage (e.g. in order to free up the semi-permanent +800K on your Thai bank-account, and have it replaced with the +400K for two months only), you would first need to 'kill' your Non Imm O-A Visa. Which means exiting Thailand (without a re-entry permit, or doing it on the last day of your current permission to stay), and then return. Easiest way would be simply coming back VisaExempt which would provide you with a 30-day Permit to stay, and then - when there are still at least 15 days left on that Permit to stay - applying at your local Imm Office for a 90-day Non Imm O Visa for reason of marriage. And in the last month of those 90-day you can then apply for a 1-year extension of that Non Imm O Visa for reason of marriage.

You would be visiting Thailand as a Tourist, and according to Thai law it is the owner of the place where you are staying (Hotel, guesthouse, friend's place) that needs to inform the local Immigration Office of the province where you are staying, that a 'foreigner' is staying at their premises. So that means, that it is actually not your concern as you are a Tourist and can stay anywhere you like in Thailand. However, if you need to apply for a 30-day extension (which can be done at ANY Thai Immigration Office) to extend your visit, the local Immigration Office will require that you present them with a copy of the TM-30 filed by the owner of the place where you are staying in their Province. So that basically means that your friend at who's farm you will be staying, has to register his place so that he is able to issue such a TM-30 when you are staying there. If he does not know how to do that or does not want to do that, an alternative solution is that you simply book a room in a cheap local Hotel/guesthouse for the night preceding the day that you plan to go to the Local Imm Office to apply for the 30-day extension. You don't even have to stay the night there, as you just need a copy of the TM-30 that they have to make stating that a foreigner is staying at their premises (so you could even bring down the one-night room-rent when you don't stay there, as the only thing you need is that TM-30 copy).

How long do you intend to stay in Thailand? #1 - If you plan to stay less than 60 days, you can either a) Apply at the Thai Embassy/Consulate in your home-country for a 60-day Tourist Visa OR b) Enter Thailand VisaExempt (without a Visa) which will provide you with a 30-day Permission to stay as stamped in your Passport by Thai border-immigration on entry. And in the course of the last 2 weeks of that Permission to stay then visit ANY Immigration Office and apply for a 30-day extension of stay, which will be added to the expiry day of your Permit. #2 - If you plan to stay between 60 and 90 days, your best option would be to apply at the Thai Embassy/Consulate in your home-country for a 60-day Tourist Visa, and then in the course of the last 2 weeks before expiry of that Visa's Permission to stay then visit ANY Immigration Office and apply for a 30-day extension of stay, which will be added to the expiry day of your Permit. #3 - If you plan to stay longer than 90 days, do let me know as there are other options then. In a separate post I will respond to your questions what needs to be done to be 'legal' during your stay in Thailand, but since you would be visting Thailand as a Tourist there is nothing to worry about.

The A.I. Dilemma - Tristan Harris & Aza Raskin - Center for Humane Technology - March 9, 2023 This < 1 hour 7 minute > video is from a presentation at a private gathering in San Francisco on March 9th with leading technologists and decision-makers with the ability to influence the future of large-language model AIs. This presentation was given before the launch of GPT-4.

See my response in this link >

There are no specific categories like marriage, retirement, dependant children and other for the Non Imm O-A Visa. The Non Imm O-A Visa is meant for people over 50 years of age that plan to stay long-term in Thailand. It can only be applied for in your home-country or country of residence, and it has that pesky mandatory Non Imm O-A compliant Health-Insurance requirement. Only under very specific circumstances would it currently make sense to apply for the Non Imm O-A Visa, as the benefits of that Visa would be off-set by that Health-Insurance requirement, especially if after the almost 2-year period that initial Visa can provide you, you would be applying for annual extensions.

In the black ribbon just below the AseanNow logo, you will see the option to click ChatGPT. When doing so a page opens where AseanNow introduces that novelty service, and provides some tips on how it works. And you can go directly to the page where you can type any question/command and the chatbot will provide you with an answer in seconds. > https://aseannow.com/thaivisa-chatgpt/ The tool is amazing when you ask a question on a specific subject which would take you quite some time to find out by yourself using a search-engine. A sort of SuperGoogle... The down-side being that on controversial subjects ChatGPT only provides 'accepted narrative' answers (as its developers deliberately built such bias in, by only feeding the database with 'trusted' sources). Give it a try, and type in your question/command, it's as simple as that...

# When applying for an extension of your Non Imm O Visa (be it for reason of retirement, marriage or any other reason) there is NO need for health-insurance. # When applying for an extension of your Non Imm O-A Visa, you need to provide evidence that you have Thai health-insurance which meets the Non Imm O-A requirements

I used AseanNow's new ChatGPT asking the question we have been discussing here for 573 pages. In a sense it is somewhat of an intelligent answer, as the chat-bot is unable to answer it and does not spout its usual 'accepted narrative' parrot-talk...

Here the 'intelligent' response from AseanNow's ChatGTP on my question.

From the article: Members will soon be able to change preferences to auto-answer topics with realistic, automated replies that consider previous posting history. Member settings allow for automatic posting of replies, freeing up time when not at the keyboard. In the future, moderation actions will also be automated. = = = Yep, a Forum where you won't know whether the replies on your post were auto-generated and you might unknowingly end up discussing with a machine. And of course AseanNow introducing that novelty also want to use it for moderation, which would absolutely kill any deviation from the accepted narrative on controversial subjects. The Ultimate Echo-Chamber...