CWMcMurray

I would also advise printing out your Plane tickets to show them... this may help

I went in today to do all of this (above)

I had asked about 2 months ago when i last did the 90 day reporting if i could do it now or must wait, they said no problem, do it anytime.

So, today i went in with everything.

Immedietly the guy said the money hadn't been in the bank long enough. (i showed him that they money had been in there for 2 years)

He then said: You can only do this 40 days before your present visa expires.

I pointed out i would be out of the country at that time and had asked last time and they said i could do it anytime.

Yeah, what he said...

If they are a BOI company and this product and raw materials required to make it were not already on their BOI List, they would need to apply to add them.

This would allow them to import the Raw Material needed Duty free and one would presume that you would also benefit from the lower costs.

So, if you are serious about it, then let them do what needs to be done to lower their manufacturing costs...

I was previously on an extension for the reason of Study and then switched to extension for the reason of staying with my Thai wife, I had to do the following...

1. Get a letter from my school confirming that I was still a student

2. Take this letter to Window #1 at Suan Plu

3. Window #1 "released" me from window #1

4. Then go to "the big room" and immediately apply for extension for the purpose of living with my Thai Family

Since you have a ED-visa and are not on an extension for the "purpose of education", not sure if you will have to do the same or not. (my guess is that you won't, but not certain)

You can do it at any of the currency exchange booths...

The 2 month rule for the first extension shows that immigration is thinking a bit...

Considering that a Non-Im O visa is only valid for 90 days... if you needed to have the money in for 3 months the forst time it would be impossible to file for extension of your first Non-Im O visa.

That is unless you have opened your Bank account and transfered the necessary funds before you arrived in Thailand???

So this way you have a couple weeks to get here get your funds situated for your first extension. After the first year you should already have everything set up...

Had to sign a form in English that I acknowledge and understand that the minimum of 400K has to be in the account for at least 3 months on the date of application for extension.

Can you confirm that they wanted to see the money in bank for 3 months and not the 2 months stated in police order 777/2551.

YES I certainly can confirm this (from desk officer and a higher-up one at Suan Plu). The 2 months only applies to a first time application after that it has to be 3 months!

Because of that I ran into problems in April and had to opt for a short 60days 'visit Thai wife' extension. There is a topic about my experience then but right now I can't find it because TV deletes my subscriptions after 15 days of no activity.

Will search for it and post the link later.

opalhort

Devi's advocate time...

You both do have a point, but I am now leaning more towards your friends point of view...

It seems to me that even you confirm that the actual value of the properties is roughly 15 mil, but that given the current economic situation you can not get any offers for what the property is actually worth.

From your partner's point of view, it sounds like he is willing to sell, but not for only 60-80% of the actual worth of the property. I would guess that he never though that his gentlemen's agreement included selling the property for signioficantly less than its worth.

So you are trying to force him to sell and take a loss of 20-40% "loss" by selling in a down market. You have also advised, that you also believe that if you wait another year or two it is likely that youcould sell at 15 mil.

Given this, maybe it is not completely unfair for you to take the entire "loss" of the selling price versus actual value of the property because you needs the funds and want to sell in a down market.

Stand by the recomendation below:

May not be exactly fair, but if he is only willing to sell at 15 mil, but you need to sell now then...

His portion of 15 mil would be 7.5 mil

If sold at 12 mil and you take away his 7.5 mil, you would be left with 4.5 mil

If you bough at 7.5 mil then your portion was 3.75 mil

This means that if you "sold" at 4.5 mil you would realize a profit of 750,000 plus the rent you have received.

It may seem remarkably unfair, but if you would be willing to sell "your half" to him at 4.5 mil, then its really the same thing (ish).

Is this acceptable to you? Is this better than taking him to court and trying to get what is fair?

Only you can answer this question...

Very good reply.

Actually it's very easy to see both sides of this story. Yes you partner is out of order for not standing by a gentleman's agreement but at the end of the day it sounds like he isn't that flushed and the thought of selling up whilst the market is depressed must be difficult for him.

Not a huge issue going back to get your extension after 30 days, but just not sure why it needs to go up the chain for "approval" while retirement can be approved on the spot?

From my understanding, the Immigration officers will not take your application unless everything required to be approved is turned in.

Is there really any additional investigation required? (other than a possible home visit on the first application)

Has anyone ever been turned down after submitting all of the required documents?

From limited reports Immigration has not been happy to issue extensions of stay for education to both parents (even when two children/deposits involved) so you may have further issues. Although your UK passports may be helpful.

If you have issues you can most likely obtain a multi entry non immigrant O visa from Perth that would allow 90 day stays for 15 months before another required.

Not sure if this would be a solution or if it would be frowned upon...

If two children, would it be possible to competely separate the visa applications for each child and each parent?

Dad takes chil #1 and apply's for ED visa and Extension on Non Im visa. If you can not get one over seas, could dad get his tourist visa and change in Thailand to Non O and then extend in Thailand?

Mom get's her Non O over seas based upon Child #2 and extends in Thailand? She also handles the Visa request for Child #2.

Is this possible? I presume if it is, then they would each need 500k in separate accounts for a total of 1 mil?

May not be exactly fair, but if he is only willing to sell at 15 mil, but you need to sell now then...

His portion of 15 mil would be 7.5 mil

If sold at 12 mil and you take away his 7.5 mil, you would be left with 4.5 mil

If you bough at 7.5 mil then your portion was 3.75 mil

This means that if you "sold" at 4.5 mil you would realize a profit of 750,000 plus the rent you have received.

It may seem remarkably unfair, but if you would be willing to sell "your half" to him at 4.5 mil, then its really the same thing (ish).

Is this acceptable to you? Is this better than taking him to court and trying to get what is fair?

Only you can answer this question...

... Until then she has a valid excuse not to do any work without a work permit.

Sounds like a good excuse to me... Sorry hunny, but you don't want me to be deported do you (insert sad puppy dog eyes here).

It may not be damaged... my old passport went through the wash and I still used it for a few more years in and out of multiple countries without a problem.

I would advise going down to immigration and ask for their help. If you have copies of the pages of your passport then the process is super easy and they can definately help you.

If not, it willbe much more difficult to find you in their system and the outcome could be less certain, but I am sure they will try to assist.

in June alone, the number of tourist arrivals has dropped from 165,000 in the same period of 2008, to 27,000 in 2009

As today is June 17th, there is still about half a month to go before one could compare the results to June last year me thinks....

At that is how they get a drop of 33%...

First half of the month 27,000 so... full month "should be 54,000

When compared to 165,000 ... 54,000 is about 33%

With all fairness... if his English was good enough to put a well written job description in English on this post, perphaps his English would also be good enough to give the presentations himself.

If anyone is really interested and looking for work, I am sure they will call to find out more details.

Just went to the link above... disregard my earlier post.

This is one of those "buy a membership to sell" pyramid business structures where you only make money by getting other people to "sell" your products while of course buying the minimum quantity required to qualify to receive commisions.

So what ends up happening is no body actually sells the products to people everyone just buys the min and recuits more people to buy the min required and so on and so on and so on...

You then get a comission on the products bought by everyone "below you". A "friend" of my wife ask us if we wanted to "join" and after a little reseach we gave the big no thank you.

Good luck on that, the last time someone I know tried she needed $20,000USD in bank account, and defiantly something that would bring you back.

I believe that the above is only partially true... they need to know 2 things

1. To be sure you will come back (this is very subjective and depends upon Visa Officer)

2. To be sure you have the funds needed for your trip (could be a package vacation or a sponsor, doesnt have to be a large sum a money in the bank)

Even if the applicant had a million dollars in the bank...they still have ATMs in the US, soit doesn't help with point number 1.

20,000 is a very arbitrary number and I am sure no visa officer at the embasy would say this is the magic number. Depends on your individual case, people with far less than this get visas every day.

O would also recomend getting a letter from your employer in Europe stating the time you have been wroking with them, the amount of time you will be given as vacation and how much longer you have on your contract.

It may go to help show that you have ties to overseas and as such you will be leaving, so she has no one in the US to stay with. It may also show them that she is not trying to do an end around applying for Fiance visa or Immigrant visa.

Given that you are only Boyfriend/ Girlfriend and not Husband/Wife less weight may be given to this, but it still may help.

If you go all the way down Soi Predee 42 (off of Sukhumvit 71) just before you get to the end of the soi, there is a sports club on the Left.

They offer swimming lessons on Saturdays. I think the fee is 50 thb. There are a bunch of other kids swimming as well.

no offense but you couldn't even get a Thai person with the requisite English skills to work for that low of a salary... triple it and you might find some one worth keeping.

I think many folks idea of the going wages in Thailand are about 10-15 years off.

unless...

Is this a part time job? Maybe 2-3 hours a day?

You might try raising the salary...

I may be going out on a limb here , but I would venture a guess that if after a month there was only one application for the job and that person left only after one week, it seems that the labour force doesn't think the salary is commensurate with the work required.

^ Thats seems to be the question...

From what I have been reading on this site and others, everyone else seems to be saying that the TL is not required for a work permit only for visa extension for the purpose of working as a teacher.

I agree it would make more sense if a professional license (ie TL) was required for work permit, not for visa extension.

I do not think he can...

I believe the Thai government would be foolish if they allowed a foreigner to do this. They would then need to monitor to ensure that he did not work over the 6 months and if he did then they would need to try and find a way to get the back taxes from his previous job before he left the country.

This would be a mess... either foreigners would need to get a release from the tax agency before being allowed to leave or you would get a lot of foreigners trying to skip out on their tax obligations.

It makes a lot more sense to put the burden on the worker to monitor his own taxes and file for refund if he over paid.

I probably have around 20-25 WP renewals on a non-ED due to various issues of re-alignment of position and fiscal dates (why there is more then just 16 for 16 years).

BTW: The position I hold at the University is formally titled by the government as "foreign expert" and not lecturer/teacher though I am currently an invited lecturer and used to teach a semester special session graduate course. My title via the university is Senior Researcher.

I may be mistaken, but I believe if the purpose of the non-ed is tostudy then no, if the purpose of the non-ed is to teach as a guest lecturer (as in your case) then maybe yes.

His non-ed was for the purpose of studying Thai, this may make a difference.

I know nothing is ever certain...

But when I was in school here I was told no... I ended up needing to switch to extension based upon marriage and then get WP for job and then continue my studies using different reason for extension.

I didn't really pursue the issue since I had an alternative route available, so not really sure if push came to shove if it would have been posible.

If you are just looking to teach in Thailand then it doesnt really mater.... Even if you are going to teach in other countries it probably doesn't matter...

-but-

If you want something that will be recognized by everyone in every country around the world without any doubt what so ever then do the CELTA.

Shouldn't matter where you do the CELTA as all trainers should be equally qualified with certification from Cambridge. Just pick the one that best suites your schedule/location.

Just ran out of time to edit...

Also does this mean that if a teacher gets an extension based upon marriage, then he doesn't need a TL ???

So is this an immigration requirement or a WP requirement?

It seems really odd if it is an immigration issue???

You would think that the purpose of a teacher's liscense would be to ensure that teachers are qualified(not saying treacher's license in its present form does this) before issuing a work permit to teach.

It doesn'y make any sense if the reality is you don't need a teachers license to teach you only need it extend your visa??? Does this mean if you are a teacher that qualifies for an alternative visa you will never need a teachers license?

It seems to be only teachers who work in primary/secondary education who need a teacher's license. Immigration requires paperwork to process a visa extension and request a teacher's license for those of us working at that level or (at least last year) a waiver from the TTC.

So does this mean a TL is only needed to get a visa extension?

If so, does this mean if a teacher does not get a TL they can still legally teach, but will need to leave the country every 3 months to get a new visa and then reapply for WP every three months? (not saying that anyone in there right mind would want to do this)