Copy shop next to Jomtien IO is "certifying" Income documents

[JLCrab]

2 minutes ago, jacko45k said:

So many are suggesting that TI want to push everyone into the hands of agents

However the O-A and the Thailand Elite are visas issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) and not extensions of stay issued by RTP Thai IMM.

[jacko45k]

4 minutes ago, JLCrab said:

However the O-A and the Thailand Elite are visas issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) and not extensions of stay issued by RTP Thai IMM.

Its a good point.

[KhunFred]

10 minutes ago, JLCrab said:

However the O-A and the Thailand Elite are visas issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) and not extensions of stay issued by RTP Thai IMM.

In the case of expats. The Extension of Stay is the only thing that matters. It gives you a right to stay here. I am unconcerned about visa types.

[JLCrab]

4 minutes ago, KhunFred said:

In the case of expats. The Extension of Stay is the only thing that matters. It gives you a right to stay here. I am unconcerned about visa types.

With an O-A you can stay up to 2 years and with the Thailand Elite you can stay up to 5 years both without an extension of stay so I'm really unconcerned about what you are unconcerned.

[KhunFred]

6 minutes ago, JLCrab said:

With an O-A you can stay up to 2 years and with the Thailand Elite you can stay up to 5 years both without an extension of stay so I'm really unconcerned about what you are unconcerned.

If you can AFFORD the "Elite" visa then you are indeed fortunate. I live on my income and have no other source of funds. My total income is about 80 thousand baht a month, MORE than enough to qualify me. Elite visas and such are for the well-heeled. Many of us worked ordinary jobs and depend on federal and state pensions and annuities. We don't have a load of spare cash to sock into a bank account so the Thais can fund their non-performing loans.

Edited November 29, 2018 by KhunFred

[JLCrab]

6 minutes ago, KhunFred said:

If you can AFFORD the "Elite" visa then you are indeed fortunate. I live on my income and have no other source of funds.

So go use an agent.

[onera1961]

7 hours ago, cyberfarang said:

But if it were me using these agency/loan sharks to obtain my yearly extension, I wouldn`t be so smug about it, I would be afraid, I would be very afraid.

Instead of putting 800K in a Thai bank and I can invest it in S&P 500 that will give me let's say 6% return (historical return of S&P 500 is 9%) over a 10 year period. Every year I just take out 25K to pay the agent. Now after 10 years, I still have my 800K (little over 1 mil). Added bonus is agents take care of everything while I sip pina colada on the beach. My criteria is agent fee should be approximately 50% of the return (around 25K). ????

Edited November 29, 2018 by onera1961

[cyberfarang]

48 minutes ago, tropo said:

Did you ever consider that they may start making it hard for people trying to do it the cheap way... in essence enticing all to use agents. Wouldn't that be an interesting turnaround?

 

 

This has been happening in Chiang Mai for the last few years and has not improved. The system or lack of system at Chiang Mai immigration whereas obtaining a number slot for the queue has become like a lottery or every man for himself. Now it seems other regions have caught on to this cash cow and at this rate will soon spread to immigration offices nationwide.

 

So what next; have to see the old lady fruit seller at the local market for yearly visa extensions?

 

At the moment they are charging around 15000 to 20000 baht under counter fees. But once more or all immigration offices begin following the Chiang Mai example of making the process of going through official channels complicated and stressful that involves maybe hours or even days of doing a merry dance routine and corruption takes over, then as far as fees are concerned, the sky`s the limit. Next year it becomes 30000 baht, then 50000 baht and even 100000, who knows.

 

Therefore, this means that those who qualify under the immigration laws to stay in Thailand long term will end up being the minority, and for a price anyone can obtain a passport stamp. Imagine what a hub for criminals Thailand is going to become, fugitives running from justice from their own countries and foreign criminal gangs in Thailand. 

 

Now I have to wonder whether the discontinued embassy letters forced on them by pressure from Thai immigration has been deliberate policy to push those who can`t raise the funds for the money in a Thai bank option to use the under counter methods. Because it`s certainly looking that way. So it`s like 50% purging down on illegal stayers and 50% encouraging illegal stayers.

 

The amazing part is that this has become an open secret, people are not even trying to be discrete about this now.

 

I do hope those who are unable to qualify to remain in the country long term and are fuelling these corrupt practices by loan sharks and corrupt officials, do eventually get their asses kicked out of Thailand. Next year will be the crunch time if BJ is true to his word and has the support and power behind him to carry out his policies.

[JLCrab]

6 minutes ago, onera1961 said:

nstead of putting 800K in a Thai bank and I can invest it in S&P 500 that will give me let's say 6% return (historical return of S&P 500 is 9%) over a 10 year period. Every year I just take out 25K to pay the agent.

And for the last 10 years I haven't put 800K baht in a Thai bank and the yearly extension costs me 1900 baht plus 1750 baht for the income affidavit and maybe one or 2 days without the beach and pina coladas out of 365.

Edited November 29, 2018 by JLCrab

[onera1961]

9 minutes ago, JLCrab said:

And for the last 10 years I haven't put 800K baht in a Thai bank and the yearly extension costs me 1900 baht plus 1750 baht for the income affidavit and maybe one or 2 days without the beach and pina coladas out of 365.

I think the discussion is about what one could do in the future not what one did in the past. After all, we are mere mortals not time lords ????

[KiChakayan]

16 hours ago, KhunFred said:

WIth the end of embassy letters, we have reached the end of the road in terms of options for renewal of extension of stay. 

How about putting the 800000 into a Thai bank account? 

Actually, I am staggered reading these threads...

[rott]

21 hours ago, mercman24 said:

i see there is even a farang guy advertising his business, *not got 800,000 ? no problem * i repeat i was offered an OFFICIAL  stamp for 16,000 baht 3 weeks ago by the immigration officer at the desk, when i went for my 90 day

Surely you understand that all agency obtained stamps are OFFICIAL stamps. Anyone trying it on with a forged stamp would be looking at serious trouble.

[onera1961]

19 minutes ago, cyberfarang said:

then as far as fees are concerned, the sky`s the limit. Next year it becomes 30000 baht, then 50000 baht and even 100000, who knows.

I think what market can bear is the limit. I can't see anybody paying 50K or 100K for a one year extension. They will price them out. 

 

20 minutes ago, cyberfarang said:

Imagine what a hub for criminals Thailand is going to become, fugitives running from justice from their own countries and foreign criminal gangs in Thailand. 

What is preventing them to come here now? Embassy letter?

[onera1961]

1 hour ago, KhunFred said:

I live on my income and have no other source of funds. My total income is about 80 thousand baht a month, MORE than enough to qualify me.

I'm sure you will find a way and they will also make it available to people like you. 80K is lots of income to live in Thailand. Some may not agree but I think so. If their intention is to push people with that kind of income and without savings to agents, so be it. Use it. People who earn around 30/40K without savings will find it hard using an agent. For them, Ecuador may be better option.

Edited November 29, 2018 by onera1961

[JackThompson]

6 hours ago, janclaes47 said:

I remember more than 2 decades ago there was a shop in Pattaya, ran by an American called Jim and his wife Mae.

 

Few time I had seen an immigration officer, in uniform, sitting behind a desk stamping a heap of passports.

 

Sure he was using a real enough stamp and his uniform looked real enough as well.

 

Then one day Pattaya mail had a headline story, when Jim and Mae were busted, and many foreigners were in a lot of trouble............with their real enough looking stamp in their passports.

I would bet good money that the guy seen in uniform was stamping in their office (unusual), in order to avoid sharing his loot with the agent-money pyramid-scheme participants.  Clearly, the others in the money-chain would have been angry, as that IO was literally taking agent-money payoffs out of their pockets. 

 

The way it normally works, a box of passports is brought into the immigration office, and all stamping is done on-site, with the requisite approvals, etc.  Of course, that was 20 years ago, so the procedure may have changed.  But I have read other reports of IOs taking stamps home and using them, but their being no record in the computer-system, which creates an overstay problem for the recipients.

[balo]

I don't believe this information at all. I have used that copyshop many times , to do copies. Never seen anyone certifying documents. 

 

 

[vogie]

3 minutes ago, balo said:

I don't believe this information at all. I have used that copyshop many times , to do copies. Never seen anyone certifying documents. 

 

 

Things have changed recently, in Thailand it's a case of 'where theres a will, there's a way'

[rott]

3 hours ago, JLCrab said:

Maybe if you choose to live in a farang ghetto like Jomtien. The reality is, if you don't then, sand or not, it maybe isn't

Why sneer at a "farang ghetto"? Does living in a one-eyed hole somewhere hours away make you superior?

 

I have lived in the "farang ghettoes" of Soi Yamato and Soi Khoatalo but there were plenty of Thai neighbours. Now I am a few hundred miles away. I enjoy going out for a drink and paying 70 or 80 for a large Leo but miss pie and chips.

 

It is all Thailand chum.

 

[JLCrab]

38 minutes ago, onera1961 said:

I think the discussion is about what one could do in the future not what one did in the past.

I've already commented multiple times about the future:

 

- 65K baht monthly FTT SWIFT transfer just in case monthly income route is approved

- OA Non-IMM Visa

- 800K in the bank for 3 months

- Thailand Elite 500K for 5 years

 

All no agent avenues in any of the above.

 

[JLCrab]

2 minutes ago, rott said:

Why sneer at a "farang ghetto"? Does living in a one-eyed hole somewhere hours away make you superior?

 

I have lived in the "farang ghettoes" of Soi Yamato and Soi Khoatalo but there were plenty of Thai neighbours. Now I am a few hundred miles away. I enjoy going out for a drink and paying 70 or 80 for a large Leo but miss pie and chips.

 

It is all Thailand chum.

 

I only mentioned the foreign ghetto in context of the population that are required to use one IMM office. But thanks for your reply. Maybe I'll sneer just the same.

[marcusarelus]

1 hour ago, onera1961 said:

Instead of putting 800K in a Thai bank and I can invest it in S&P 500 that will give me let's say 6% return (historical return of S&P 500 is 9%) over a 10 year period. Every year I just take out 25K to pay the agent. Now after 10 years, I still have my 800K (little over 1 mil). Added bonus is agents take care of everything while I sip pina colada on the beach. My criteria is agent fee should be approximately 50% of the return (around 25K). ????

You don't live in Thailand and never invested in the S&P 500.  What else do you want to write about that you have no actual experience with?

[steve187]

19 hours ago, KittenKong said:

For your information, everything I do is done strictly by the book. My visa extension is submitted at the correct time with all the required documents (which are very easy to obtain) and I have never had the slightest difficulty in getting the extension I expected to get and for the minimum official price, with no extra costs or fees or bribes of any type. All done entirely by me without the assistance of any sort of agent or intermediary of any type. And the entire procedure this year took me well under one hour.

 

The same applies to my 90-day reporting - which only takes minutes - and also to my yearly tax return here which took me about 30 minutes.

 

If I can do it anyone can.

but doing it strictly by the book depends on which office one uses, i tried strictly by the book last year to do a conversion to non imm 'o' visa to be followed up by a yearly extension, (money in bank all correct) the local office to me said it could not be done, ''go to UK or Laos'' i was told, so had to use an 'agent ' at another office to do it. the office i tried was just lazy, and as far as i know no corruption there.

[JackThompson]

 

2 hours ago, jacko45k said:

The same could have been said about the passport only visa runs some years ago, nevertheless having the illegal stamp in your passport became a serious issue.

Yes, higher-ups were apparently not cut-in on this scheme.  And therein lies the rub, how to know if the players are "playing properly?"  I would be much more worried about that, than the entire system crashing down.

 

2 hours ago, jacko45k said:

The same could have been said about the passport only visa runs some years ago, nevertheless having the illegal stamp in your passport became a serious issue. We are possibly in a climate here where someone wants to reduce bribes and corruption.

That usually amount to re-organizing it for higher-returns - ala the "ED" crackdown.
 

2 hours ago, jacko45k said:

We have 2 ex-PMs who thought they were above all laws who are running around with no home to go to. 

Maybe they tried to "crack-down" on the agent-money system?  (humor, but there are many such systems which could have been threatened)

 

2 hours ago, KhunFred said:

Worrying about "legitimacy" in a country which overthrows elected governments on a whim, is just simplistic western thinking. Follow the money and there's your extension.

It wasn't a "whim" by any stretch (whether you love or hate it) - but should discuss that tangent elsewhere.

 

What I would worry about, is a particular "connection" failing.  Also, non-legit actions provide leverage which can be held over you.  Best to be able to prove that every extension you have received met all the requirements.

[cyberfarang]

55 minutes ago, balo said:

I don't believe this information at all. I have used that copyshop many times , to do copies. Never seen anyone certifying documents. 

 

 

Actually, on reading the OP again, I am having doubts about this story. I heard it from a fellow expat he said.

 

Sounds like a load of bull which I`m calling on this, heard it from a friend of a friend. Can anyone else substantiate this is true?

 

 

[JackThompson]

2 hours ago, JLCrab said:

However the O-A and the Thailand Elite are visas issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) and not extensions of stay issued by RTP Thai IMM.

None of the Elite money goes to immigration higher-ups?  I bet it does.

The Non-OA Visa requires a trip home - total costs and trouble far exceeding an agent-extension, so not a "threat" to "business."  By contrast, the embassy-letters cost less than agent-fees. 

 

2 hours ago, jacko45k said:

I certainly hope you are correct and while I haven't had an issue doing this for some years recent events, and the ensuing worry-fest, put me on edge.

So many are suggesting that TI want to push everyone into the hands of agents, or extra go betweens, all taking a little wad for their own services, and increasing their income, that a large number of people with such a wad sitting idly in the bank must look like a tasty steak instead of that plate of fries. 

The goal is to get a percentage of applicants paying agent-money.  They don't have to get every last one.  When they develop a tolerance to their latest increase in agent-money, they will probably just raise the min-requirements, to increase the dosage.  But this big jump in brown-envelope revenue should give us a reprieve, for awhile.

 

1 hour ago, cyberfarang said:

Therefore, this means that those who qualify under the immigration laws to stay in Thailand long term will end up being the minority, and for a price anyone can obtain a passport stamp. Imagine what a hub for criminals Thailand is going to become, fugitives running from justice from their own countries and foreign criminal gangs in Thailand.  

Adding more legit applicants to the agent-system won't change the criminal element, which is already present.  It's not some expats avoiding the financials that creates the danger.  The point of all the TM-30s, 90-day reports, home-visits, etc is based on security - which I respect (though it needs to be streamlined for efficiency).  A widespread payoff-system exists to skip all that.  The criminal/security problem will persist as long as the agent-system exists in its current form. 

 

1 hour ago, cyberfarang said:

Now I have to wonder whether the discontinued embassy letters forced on them by pressure from Thai immigration has been deliberate policy to push those who can`t raise the funds for the money in a Thai bank option to use the under counter methods. Because it`s certainly looking that way. So it`s like 50% purging down on illegal stayers and 50% encouraging illegal stayers.

 

The amazing part is that this has become an open secret, people are not even trying to be discrete about this now.

 

I do hope those who are unable to qualify to remain in the country long term and are fuelling these corrupt practices by loan sharks and corrupt officials, do eventually get their asses kicked out of Thailand. Next year will be the crunch time if BJ is true to his word and has the support and power behind him to carry out his policies. 

The ones fueling the corrupt practices are in the uniforms.  They literally "manufacture" the demand.  Rejecting embassy-letters is part of that operating procedure, following on the heels of the increasing irrelevant gauntlet they put folks married to Thais through, plus what you described about CM.

 

And you are mixing-up 2 categories of people - "Bad" people / criminals, who have plenty of money to pay agents - and "Good" people who will have trouble showing income without an embassy-letter. 

 

I really doubt criminals were going to get embassy letters every year - especially "wanted" criminals.  That was another function of the embassy-letter system - acting as a check that the applicant was not someone afraid to go to their embassy and present themselves.

 

The people who will no longer be able to stay without an agent-letter are in the harmless, 2nd category.  Assuming they have the needed gross-income (as was always the standard), they may not be able to provide backing-docs in the form of a govt/state pension for the full amount (other investments), and/or transfer the full amount monthly to a Thai bank account. 

 

And then there are some who fall short of the income - maybe live here on 40K/mo  - which is plenty, and many with the money "in the bank" live on less.  But, in any case, these are not "bad" people, and their absence would only harm the Thai businesses they frequent - not in any way improve the country.

 

1 hour ago, KiChakayan said:

How about putting the 800000 into a Thai bank account? 

Actually, I am staggered reading these threads...

Welcome to the world of those with less financial-resources.  The question is, what should those folks sell to accomplish that 800K Thai bank-balance?  Rental property, a business or other investments?  And how to fill the hole in their income that results? 

 

If Thailand wants more expats spending less money into the economy / being generally poorer, forcing this result would be one way to achieve that.

[KhunFred]

2 minutes ago, JackThompson said:

 

 

Welcome to the world of those with less financial-resources.  The question is, what should those folks sell to accomplish that 800K Thai bank-balance?  Rental property, a business or other investments?  And how to fill the hole in their income that results? 

 

If Thailand wants more expats spending less money into the economy / being generally poorer, forcing this result would be one way to achieve that.

Again, the point is missed. Those of us who live month to month on our income, DO NOT HAVE property, businesses or ANYTHING to sell. We live on our income which is state and federal government-based, along with annuities. Why is this so difficult for many to understand?  We MORE than qualify at around 80 thousand a month, yet many of you are saying that we shouldn't be here because we didn't retire as millionaires.

[janclaes47]

4 minutes ago, JackThompson said:

Welcome to the world of those with less financial-resources.  The question is, what should those folks sell to accomplish that 800K Thai bank-balance?  Rental property, a business or other investments?  And how to fill the hole in their income that results? 

 

If Thailand wants more expats spending less money into the economy / being generally poorer, forcing this result would be one way to achieve that.

Thailand wants expats to spend more money in the economy, and the change may force the less financial strong expats to go back home.

[JackThompson]

1 minute ago, KhunFred said:

Again, the point is missed. Those of us who live month to month on our income, DO NOT HAVE property, businesses or ANYTHING to sell. We live on our income which is state and federal government-based, along with annuities. Why is this so difficult for many to understand?  We MORE than qualify at around 80 thousand a month, yet many of you are saying that we shouldn't be here because we didn't retire as millionaires.

I am certainly not saying that - quite the opposite. 

 

But point taken on those who have nothing to cash in at all, but still meet the income-requirements.  They are even more shafted than those who would have to harm their income-streams to put 800K in the bank.

[Pattaya46]

2 hours ago, cyberfarang said:

Now I have to wonder whether the discontinued embassy letters forced on them by pressure from Thai immigration has been deliberate policy to push those who can`t raise the funds for the money in a Thai bank option to use the under counter methods.

No need to wonder; Just look at facts. Thai Immigration didn't asked embassies to discontinue their Income Letters, and there is not any reason to think that Thai Immigration will not continue to accept these letters in the future.

[KhunFred]

1 hour ago, balo said:

I don't believe this information at all. I have used that copyshop many times , to do copies. Never seen anyone certifying documents. The entire office is on the take, that should be obvious to anyone who has used it. Why else would they put up signs that say "no tips"??  They are merely adapting to changing regulations from their bosses. There is always a way to sidestep regulations in Thailand. It goes on at all levels of government.

 

 

When they were still issuing income affidavits there was no NEED for them to offer this service. They are owned and operated by IO workers. They have an inside track.

Edited November 29, 2018 by KhunFred