Outrageous

A Japanese friend and I were recently talking about retirement visa renewal. She is stressed out at the thought of dealing with Thai immigration and hires an attorney to handle all retirement visa paperwork for her. She told me that she tried to do it herself her first year here year and it involved 3 or 4 days/trips to Immigration because she didn’t have the correct paperwork and had to make multiple visits. She tells me that immigration speaks only Thai and some English so Japanese people have to struggle thru the English as she has not met any that speak Japanese.

She as well as all of her Japanese friends, use an attorney to handle the paperwork for them. I asked her how much she had to pay and was shocked to hear that she (and her friends) pay 50,000 BAHT per year. This includes the fees for her visa renewal (fee 1900 baht), the multiple re-entry permit (fee 3800 baht) and the handling of the 90 day reporting (no fee). The direct fees noted amount to 5,700 baht or 11% of the total cost. Apparently there are several Japanese attorneys who handle this kind of work in Bkk and their fees are always 50,000 baht.

I have a few Western friends who use an attorney because they don’t want to deal with immigration and they pay about 10,000 baht for the cost plus fees. I told her that I didn’t understand why the cost was so high relative to what a westerner pays. The only difference uncovered is that her attorney is a Japanese attorney vs. my western friend’s Thai attorney who speaks English.

50,000 baht is a pretty high price to pay for that comfort level.

I told her to find a student who speaks Japanese and pay them 1,000-4,000 to accompany her to Immigration to act as an interpreter for her.

Any other thoughts?

Go to a non-japanese attorney?

Why pay five times the price.

Learn to speak English?

Outrageous

A Japanese friend and I were recently talking about retirement visa renewal. She is stressed out at the thought of dealing with Thai immigration and hires an attorney to handle all retirement visa paperwork for her. She told me that she tried to do it herself her first year here year and it involved 3 or 4 days/trips to Immigration because she didn’t have the correct paperwork and had to make multiple visits. She tells me that immigration speaks only Thai and some English so Japanese people have to struggle thru the English as she has not met any that speak Japanese.

She as well as all of her Japanese friends, use an attorney to handle the paperwork for them. I asked her how much she had to pay and was shocked to hear that she (and her friends) pay 50,000 BAHT per year. This includes the fees for her visa renewal (fee 1900 baht), the multiple re-entry permit (fee 3800 baht) and the handling of the 90 day reporting (no fee). The direct fees noted amount to 5,700 baht or 11% of the total cost. Apparently there are several Japanese attorneys who handle this kind of work in Bkk and their fees are always 50,000 baht.

I have a few Western friends who use an attorney because they don’t want to deal with immigration and they pay about 10,000 baht for the cost plus fees. I told her that I didn’t understand why the cost was so high relative to what a westerner pays. The only difference uncovered is that her attorney is a Japanese attorney vs. my western friend’s Thai attorney who speaks English.

50,000 baht is a pretty high price to pay for that comfort level.

I told her to find a student who speaks Japanese and pay them 1,000-4,000 to accompany her to Immigration to act as an interpreter for her.

Any other thoughts?

No it's not.It's a very reasonable fee which is rather lower than that charged by the top Bangkok law firms for the same service.Of course it can be done much more cheaply but for many international firms it's a reasonable amount given it would involve the supervision of a senior partner.Of course it's very routine business and the bulk of the work is done by relatively junior staff, but there is the comfort level of knowing everything is being done to the book as well as the right of redress in the unlikely event anything goes wrong.To put Bt 50,000 in perspective, it may be a lot to you and me but to a senior lawyer it's just a couple of hours charging time.

Outrageous

A Japanese friend and I were recently talking about retirement visa renewal. She is stressed out at the thought of dealing with Thai immigration and hires an attorney to handle all retirement visa paperwork for her. She told me that she tried to do it herself her first year here year and it involved 3 or 4 days/trips to Immigration because she didn’t have the correct paperwork and had to make multiple visits. She tells me that immigration speaks only Thai and some English so Japanese people have to struggle thru the English as she has not met any that speak Japanese.

She as well as all of her Japanese friends, use an attorney to handle the paperwork for them. I asked her how much she had to pay and was shocked to hear that she (and her friends) pay 50,000 BAHT per year. This includes the fees for her visa renewal (fee 1900 baht), the multiple re-entry permit (fee 3800 baht) and the handling of the 90 day reporting (no fee). The direct fees noted amount to 5,700 baht or 11% of the total cost. Apparently there are several Japanese attorneys who handle this kind of work in Bkk and their fees are always 50,000 baht.

I have a few Western friends who use an attorney because they don’t want to deal with immigration and they pay about 10,000 baht for the cost plus fees. I told her that I didn’t understand why the cost was so high relative to what a westerner pays. The only difference uncovered is that her attorney is a Japanese attorney vs. my western friend’s Thai attorney who speaks English.

50,000 baht is a pretty high price to pay for that comfort level.

I told her to find a student who speaks Japanese and pay them 1,000-4,000 to accompany her to Immigration to act as an interpreter for her.

Any other thoughts?

No it's not.It's a very reasonable fee which is rather lower than that charged by the top Bangkok law firms for the same service.Of course it can be done much more cheaply but for many international firms it's a reasonable amount given it would involve the supervision of a senior partner.Of course it's very routine business and the bulk of the work is done by relatively junior staff, but there is the comfort level of knowing everything is being done to the book as well as the right of redress in the unlikely event anything goes wrong.To put Bt 50,000 in perspective, it may be a lot to you and me but to a senior lawyer it's just a couple of hours charging time.

mate of mine had an overstay of about one year a few years back, he went to a "law firm" who provided a "lawyer" = interpreter for six grand for 1 hour to accompany my mate to immi and yip yap for about 5 mins before he was told to pay up 20k and produce his outward ticket.

when it was all said and done i asked him why he didnt ask me to go to immi with him. he said because i wasnt a "lawyer". lol. this was about ten years ago before baht devaluation. so adjusted we look at about 10k baht for one hours work for billing out a fresh ramkhamheng grad.

nice going

I work with some Japanese people and most would rather deal with Japanese people if they can, and even if it means paying well over the odds. I guess it might also explain why they are the biggest investors in Thailand, - if they pay five times as much as everyone else. <smiles>

No it's not.It's a very reasonable fee which is rather lower than that charged by the top Bangkok law firms for the same service.Of course it can be done much more cheaply but for many international firms it's a reasonable amount given it would involve the supervision of a senior partner.Of course it's very routine business and the bulk of the work is done by relatively junior staff, but there is the comfort level of knowing everything is being done to the book as well as the right of redress in the unlikely event anything goes wrong.To put Bt 50,000 in perspective, it may be a lot to you and me but to a senior lawyer it's just a couple of hours charging time.

I have heard of up to 80,000 Baht being charged for the retirement visa.

Makes our professional fee of 6,500 Baht pretty reasonable. We complete the process within one hour to three hours after the client comes to our office as well.

We give a loyalty savings of 2,600 Baht starting the second year. Hence, its just 3,900 Baht for the renewal of the visa every year, which is even more reasonable.

Our business model is all about low cost, service and referrals.

www.sunbeltasiagroup.com

Going on about how much more Japanese people pay for everything is a common topic and always makes some people feel better about themselves.

The Japanese are shrewd business people, but since they often operate off a differenct cost model they sometimes appear to be rather stupid to us.

TH