thaitanic

Thank you all for the replies, especially those that alerted me to the ease of applying on https://www.thaievisa.go.th/. I will do that.

Thank you scubascuba3 and DrJack54. So there is no requirement to actually be drawing a state pension? In any case, my feeling now is that it will be easier enter Thailand visa-exempt and get a non-imm O visa via form TM.87.

I'm a 58-year-old Brit. For the past few years I have been mostly living in Thailand on a non-immigrant 'O' visa which I extend for a year every November at Samut Prakan. I am NOT drawing a UK state pension. I keep 800k Baht in an SCB account. I am currently in the UK and due to return to Thailand in November, in time to renew the visa, but I am considering extending my UK trip past the renewal deadline date to January, and so will need to apply for a new non-immigrant visa. I was thinking of applying in the UK before I return to Thailand, but the Royal Thai Embassy London page at https://london.thaiembassy.org/en/page/retirement-visa states the visa is for "pensioner aged 50 or above with state pension who wishes to stay in Thailand for no longer than 90 days". And the Hull consulate (http://www.thaiconsul-uk.com/non-immigrant-visa-cat-o-pensioner.php) states that the visa is for persons "who are receiving a UK State Pension". So where can I get a non-immigrant 'O' visa just on the basis of being over 50, without the requirement of actually drawing a pension? I am happy to visit an embassy in a neighbouring S.E. Asian country in January if necessary, and actually have to go to Ho Chi Minh (where there is a consulate) anyway. Or should I get a tourist visa in the UK and convert it to a non-immigrant 'O' visa at Samut Prakan? I think I probably did that last time (a few years ago), but can't really remember.

So I went to Samut Prakan immigration today and spoke to 2 different officials. They said that the reason that my report was rejected with the reason "Incorrect entry date upon entry into the kingdom/ Incorrect visa expiration date." was not in fact for those reasons but because I had left it too late (2 days before 90-day deadline). They also said it was nothing to do with it being my first report after leaving the country. The first official, who had loads of stripes down her arms, said submitting a 90 day report online must be done exactly 15 days before the 90-day deadline, no sooner, no later, even if that's a weekend. The second official was a bit more relaxed about the exact day but said that the system is not working well and is automatically rejecting lots of applications. He said the sooner you do it before the deadline (up to 15 days before), the better. He said next time, if it gets rejected, call him on 0631871178 to see if he can get it approved without me having to go there in person. I guess that's a Samut Prakan number so probably no use calling it if you're in another province.

Thanks @howerdw and @transam. I did leave the country since my last report, and returned in November. I do recall a similar issue that affected me in 2021 (with a different rejection message), but hoped it was fixed by now, or at least the rejection message corrected to make sense. And I did make the same trip overseas last year and was able to submit my first 90-day report afterwards successfully online 🤷‍♂️. Anyway, I'll go in person tomorrow. Cheers.

Submitted online yesterday. Rejected today with the reason, "Incorrect entry date upon entry into the kingdom/ Incorrect visa expiration date." But these were not incorrect. I've run out of time to try again as the deadline is tomorrow, so I'll go to Samut Prakan and do in person, and try to find out the real reason for rejection.

How about a flowchart version? It might not be correct. I'm trying to get my head around this myself. I'm sure I'll be told if it isn't. Obviously it doesn't make reference to dual tax treaties at all.

Well, the visa was granted and collected today exactly 2 weeks after my girlfriend's appointment, not 6 weeks as we were lead to expect. She does have a history of going to the UK and returning, so that is in her favour, and we were extremely careful with the documentation, but nonetheless it is surprising. Perhaps they've made some changes to the approval process to try and clear the backlog.

Thank you @mnomad. We paid for the visa application today and were forwarded to the VFS site to make the appointment. The first free appointment was 19 days away on 18th May. However we could get an appointment on 5th May by paying 3400 Baht for the "Priority Lounge" service, or we could have got an appointment as early as 4th by paying 3450 Baht for a "Prime Time" (after working hours) service. So we went for 5th May and paid 3600 Baht for the "Gold Premium" service, which includes document scanning on top of the other Premium Lounge services. We can't face doing self-upload of so many documents after the traumatic failures in previous years.

Does anyone know how soon UK visa appointments are currently available at VFS in Bangkok? It seems there is no way to see available appointment slots until we've completed the application and paid the fee, but we really need to know how soon the appointment is likely to be so we can plan the trip. Thanks for any insights.