SURVEY: Will the new financial requirements force you to leave?

[marcusarelus]

1 minute ago, Psimbo said:

Can we have an 'I am completely unaffected by this but will continue to wail, beat my chest and rip my clothes asunder' option please. ????

 

Seriously, I wonder how many of the countless people who have commented on this issue over numerous threads ARE actually affected by it either way.

 

I would suggest that the number is probably in the low hundreds at most.

 

Edit: the stats of the poll so far seem to back this up

The same in all the threads about the new regulations.  Most of the posts are the same old posters complaining about Thailand and I'm going to Vietnam or PI.

[montereyjp]

It not a matter of not having the funds but why should I be forced to keep so much money in a bank with an account that pays next to nothing in interest? I also don't need 65k baht to live a month in Thailand but Thai immigration thinks I do. But Why is it that a foreigner is only required to make 50k baht on a work permit but 65k to be retired here... At the end of the day like a lot of things here it makes no sense. But really no one has to worry the right Visa agent or the person in the back office can bypass the requirements if your a nice per$on.$$..

[OJAS]

2 hours ago, nchuckle said:

You must have a Bangkok bank account which for the moment is showing FTT. I’m Kasikorn and it’s 'domestic transfer'. A poster contacted Transferwise who advised them that they used Bangkok bank as the intermediary which is why it it showed up that way but they also told her they have options to use 2 other banks so could not guarantee that would remain the case. You’ve only got to be caught out once like that in a whole year and the basis of your next application is voided.

 

1 hour ago, Suradit69 said:

I believe all TW transfers come to Bangkok Bank first so if you have an account there it's shown as an international transfer.. If you use a different bank, the money is then transferred from Bangkok Bank to your banK so it appears to be a domestic transfer as far as your bank is concerned.

I have a Bangkok Bank account and made several TransferWise transfers into it. In all but 1 case, these transfers were also routed through Bangkok Bank and ended up coded FTT in my passbook. In the remaining case, though, the transfer was routed through TMB and ended up coded SMT in my passbook - which, I was advised in response to an enquiry I initiated on the banking forum, stood for the following:- 

SMT

System for Managing Automated Retail Funds Transfer

Service for interbank funds transfer via online order submission

Clearly not even a teeny-weeny whiff of any "international transfer" odour about it! For this reason I have stopped using TransferWise for my future 65k+ monthly transfers from the UK.

 

 

 

 

[XzytePattaya]

I lived in Thailand for 18 years continuously with working permits etc married and children, they keep on doing difficult every year, and if you compere international schools and cost of living with health insurance you finally make the same step as me. Just go there for 3 months per year, anyway if you stay outside from the EU for more than 180 days , you loose your residence in your country. (officially spoken) 

And as it is not that cheap anymore in Thailand, 30% more expensive than Belgium or The Netherlands.

I mean groceries etc.

I applied several times for residence , never a success. Changing law all times.

Example your Thai wife has 1.000.000 a year and you don't have income means no Visa. if you follow the law. According convention of Geneva families can stay together at all times, Thailand signed this agreement.

And still difficult with 90 days and photo's from your home and family etc, 400.000 in the bank. you can't have a normal family live in TH. They don.t see you as a family, bank account on two names is for visa unacceptable. So and Eurasian can not apply for government jobs unless you are the 3th generation. 

I talked with many Chinese who still after 20 years working do not get residence and have to go every 90 days report.

Thailand is for Thais and you are the guy from India as living in the UK, never become British, even if you have the Thai passport you never a Thai.

Not to mention if you do something wrong, even you are married !! you get deported out of TH. Nice ha?

So ? Stay in EU and go on holiday to Cambodia or Laos Vietnam and wave your hands when flying over Bangkok

TH 18 or even 10 years ago and now has changed a lot, not in a positive way.

 

Welcome back in the EU, also here we have beer and sun and less insects.

Belgium is the place to be. And I stay Dutch.

[OJAS]

18 minutes ago, XzytePattaya said:

Welcome back in the EU,

Not a guaranteed relocation option for us Brits after 29th March of course. If The Tusk Master and ol' Jean-Claude have their way we Brits will probably be subject to even more draconian immigration requirements to live there than we are here in Thailand!

[kokesaat]

I would think the new rules would affect people who are considering retiring to Thailand.....more so than those already here.

If I rolled the clock back 22 years and knew what I know today about immigration rules (through the internet....which I didn't have 22 years ago), I'd most likely not make the move.....even though money is not the problem.  

The problem is all the horror stories you hear about immigration......when, in fact, 22 years here and zero problems with immigration.  

[crazykopite]

I am comfortable and use the 800,000 route however I have made my mind up to move on as I have grown tired of the constant changing regulations and I can only see it getting worse every year when it comes to renewing my extension of stay the rules have changed every immigration office is different but here on Samui nobody tells you of the changes and still we don’t have 90 day reporting on line last time I renewed I handed all my documents and passport in at the desk only to be told to keep my processing ticket and report back in 7 days I live on a neighbouring island which meant additional travel costs as well as another day wasted this was not a one off it’s done on a regular basis . Very frustrating.

[ChouDoufu]

no, absolutely no problem meeting the requirements.

 

my complaints are 1) the requirements are not clearly defined, 2) they are not reasonably disseminated to the affected public, and 3) they are not enforced uniformly.

 

given the "additional requirements as  determined by the IO" in the regulations, and you have a recipe for guaranteed corruption.

[Sheryl]

46 minutes ago, Ahab said:

I think the people that are following the rules will not have an issue, but those that are currently barely meeting (or slightly fudging) the fiscal requirements are the ones that will be having an issue.

Plenty of us who fully follow the rules and have adequate financial means are flummoxed by these new rules.

 

having enough money to meet the requirements does nto solve the problem  of how to document that trabsfers came from abroad when they are, for various reasons, coded as domestic by your bank, nor explain how the combo method now  works,  which is totally unclear from the new directive. Nor does it give any assurrance that  IOs will not require a minimum of 400k starting right at 1 March even for extensions issued under the prior rules - at which time not only were we not required to keep the money unspent but actively discouraged from it in many locations. 

 

There are  legitimate issues here that have nothing to do with insufficient funds or trying to fudge the rules.

 

It is also nto unreasonable to object to being forced to spend unnecessarily high amounts on money transfers because someone has arbitrarily decided income must be transferred in every single month.

[Ahab]

39 minutes ago, montereyjp said:

It not a matter of not having the funds but why should I be forced to keep so much money in a bank with an account that pays next to nothing in interest? I also don't need 65k baht to live a month in Thailand but Thai immigration thinks I do. But Why is it that a foreigner is only required to make 50k baht on a work permit but 65k to be retired here... At the end of the day like a lot of things here it makes no sense. But really no one has to worry the right Visa agent or the person in the back office can bypass the requirements if your a nice per$on.$$..

It really does not matter if it "makes sense" it is the immigration rules that you have to follow to legally reside here in Thailand. The US and UK also have rules that probably make little sense, but that doesn't make them any less or more legal.

[marcusarelus]

42 minutes ago, montereyjp said:

It not a matter of not having the funds but why should I be forced to keep so much money in a bank with an account that pays next to nothing in interest? I also don't need 65k baht to live a month in Thailand but Thai immigration thinks I do. But Why is it that a foreigner is only required to make 50k baht on a work permit but 65k to be retired here... At the end of the day like a lot of things here it makes no sense. But really no one has to worry the right Visa agent or the person in the back office can bypass the requirements if your a nice per$on.$$..

To pay for emergencies you may have while in Thailand as opposed to the Thai government picking up the expenditures.  2% interest with the currency fluctuations of your own currency figured in is not too bad?  How much would you earn in a bank at home considering your currency to Thai baht value?

[marcusarelus]

11 minutes ago, crazykopite said:

I am comfortable and use the 800,000 route however I have made my mind up to move on as I have grown tired of the constant changing regulations and I can only see it getting worse every year when it comes to renewing my extension of stay the rules have changed every immigration office is different but here on Samui nobody tells you of the changes and still we don’t have 90 day reporting on line last time I renewed I handed all my documents and passport in at the desk only to be told to keep my processing ticket and report back in 7 days I live on a neighbouring island which meant additional travel costs as well as another day wasted this was not a one off it’s done on a regular basis . Very frustrating.

What changes to the 800,000 route that you use have been constantly changed or are you making that up?  If you are just whinging about Thailand your post makes sense but since there has been only one change to the 800,000 rule you must be making it up. 

[bwpage3]

8 hours ago, Chicken George said:

When will the Thai government realise its not what you have in the bank its how much you spend here. 

I get it that they want money in the bank to show but Ive met people who have that but spend less than 20k a month.. They should let anyone come ad long as they have say 25k a month which is higher than the average Thai.

Also this new idea about keeping 800k in the babk 6 months a year will just make the crooked police and visa agents richer. They are going to ask now I expect 70k a year for the no money in the bank service.

When will Thai visa stop advertising this service?

I for one would not use it as if caught expect to spend a few years in prison!

The Thai government will NEVER realize because they really don't want you here. They want to come for a holiday, drop all your cash and go home

[marcusarelus]

9 minutes ago, bwpage3 said:

The Thai government will NEVER realize because they really don't want you here. They want to come for a holiday, drop all your cash and go home

Think it through.  If that was the case then all retirement visas would be stopped and only tourist visas allowed.  They want people to retire here just not poor people. 

[bwpage3]

And to think of all the personal bashing I took when my family and I decided to move back to the USA a few years ago.

 

Great, great life and do NOT have to be bothered by income laws, VISA's or anything else.

 

Peaceful and no stress, the way life should be.

 

[skatewash]

7 hours ago, Peter Denis said:

I stopped working at 60 and live in Thailand now making use of the ME visa option (living close to the cambodian border makes it easy to do a 2-monthly border-run).  I have enough funds but unfortunately cannot yet apply for a retiree visa as one of the - illogical - requirements from the thai embassy in Belgium for such a visa is that you need to demonstrate both enough funds (over 800.000 THB) as well as proof of monthly income.  But as I stopped working I do not have such monthly income, and hence have to wait till I am 63, when I will get my monthly pension.  The moment I have at least 3 monthly pension payments I will apply for the retiree visa.  To answer the survey question > I am in the lucky circumstance that parking 800.000 THB or more on a thai bank account is no issue.  And that's what I will do, so there will be no problem demonstrating that I meet the requirements for extension of my retiree visa once I have it.  But I do feel for the farangs who do not have 800.000 THB 'spare money' and are now in the rather difficult position to cough up 400.000 THB and will be confined to make use of the 'agency trick' for the remainder 400.000 THB. 

Deleted

[ocddave]

1 minute ago, marcusarelus said:

Think it through.  If that was the case then all retirement visas would be stopped and only tourist visas allowed.  They want people to retire here just not poor people. 

They are just slowly pushing people away, best way to do it actually. If they outright ended Visa's that would make a bigger stink, when you want to make someone leave, you just make it harder on them until they make the choice themselves. 

[marcusarelus]

1 minute ago, bwpage3 said:

And to think of all the personal bashing I took when my family and I decided to move back to the USA a few years ago.

 

Great, great life and do NOT have to be bothered by income laws, VISA's or anything else.

 

Peaceful and no stress, the way life should be.

 

On a positive note thank god that the "new financial requirements did not force you to move" (topic you are posing in)  Your only reason for posting is to act smug and laugh at the people who aren't rich enough or silly enough to move back to America. 

[marcusarelus]

1 minute ago, ocddave said:

They are just slowly pushing people away, best way to do it actually. If they outright ended Visa's that would make a bigger stink, when you want to make someone leave, you just make it harder on them until they make the choice themselves. 

What historical information do you base that on? Or are you just grabbing that one out of the Thai negative bashing hat full of ideas box. 

[Sheryl]

45 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

To pay for emergencies you may have while in Thailand as opposed to the Thai government picking up the expenditures. 

You are NOT allowed to use it to pay for emergencies.  At least nto without forfeiting your extension.

[marcusarelus]

5 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

You are NOT allowed to use it to pay for emergencies.  At least nto without forfeiting your extension.

You pay for the emergencies by wiring in more money as your money is held hostage to insure payment.  Now you can simply do a runner on the bill.  It is like a surety bond. When I was in emergency they asked my wife to guarantee payment before they started treating me.  If there was a new law they would only have to check my visa to know how much I had in the bank. 

 

Yes I realize the flaws in this argument but one has to realize we are dealing with government employees with this whole thing. 

[ocddave]

1 minute ago, marcusarelus said:

What historical information do you base that on? Or are you just grabbing that one out of the Thai negative bashing hat full of ideas box. 

Business practices I have seen in action, its no different here, its the easier way to do it, and you don't appear so much like the bad guy. You don't want your customer to hate you, but if your prices/rates are too high, they leave on their own....and viola, the end result is had, and no hard feelings.

[skatewash]

7 hours ago, Peter Denis said:

I stopped working at 60 and live in Thailand now making use of the ME visa option (living close to the cambodian border makes it easy to do a 2-monthly border-run).  I have enough funds but unfortunately cannot yet apply for a retiree visa as one of the - illogical - requirements from the thai embassy in Belgium for such a visa is that you need to demonstrate both enough funds (over 800.000 THB) as well as proof of monthly income.  But as I stopped working I do not have such monthly income, and hence have to wait till I am 63, when I will get my monthly pension.  The moment I have at least 3 monthly pension payments I will apply for the retiree visa.  To answer the survey question > I am in the lucky circumstance that parking 800.000 THB or more on a thai bank account is no issue.  And that's what I will do, so there will be no problem demonstrating that I meet the requirements for extension of my retiree visa once I have it.  But I do feel for the farangs who do not have 800.000 THB 'spare money' and are now in the rather difficult position to cough up 400.000 THB and will be confined to make use of the 'agency trick' for the remainder 400.000 THB. 

Maybe I'm misunderstanding but if you're over 50 years of age and have 800,000 THB can't you convert your current visa to a non-imm O visa at your local immigration office (might even have to be done in Bangkok, I'm not sure) then deposit the 800,000 THB in a Thai bank, in two months go to extend your stay in Thailand for purpose of retirement and receive permission to stay for 1 year.

 

I understand that you might have to be 63 to satisfy the Thai Embassy in Belgium to grant you a non-imm O-A (long stay) visa, but I think you should be able to do what I've outlined in the previous paragraph.  Maybe one of the resident experts can correct or confirm what I've written?

[marcusarelus]

3 minutes ago, ocddave said:

Business practices I have seen in action, its no different here, its the easier way to do it, and you don't appear so much like the bad guy. You don't want your customer to hate you, but if your prices/rates are too high, they leave on their own....and viola, the end result is had, and no hard feelings.

So you know of a business that does not want customers and raises prices to drive them out?  What business would that be?

[Sheryl]

8 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

You pay for the emergencies by wiring in more money as your money is held hostage to insure payment.  Now you can simply do a runner on the bill.  It is like a surety bond. 

And through what mechanism does your creditor then get the money?  Through what mechanism is it "held hostage"?  What  prevents someone  from withdrawing it and leaving the country with it, bill still unpaid? Or just staying here and dodging their creditors?

 

I don't see it. There does not seem to be any mechanism in place that serves the purpose you mention. Meanwhile, having 400-800K of one's savings taken away will surely increase the frequency with which people here are unable to cover emergency costs, because everyone's financial cushion is going to go down by that amount.

 

Something like this could be designed as a surety bond,  but this has not been done that way.

 

 

 

 

[ocddave]

17 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

So you know of a business that does not want customers and raises prices to drive them out?  What business would that be?

Why don't you take a guess, but I thought that was obvious. I am not naming the business though, but its normal practice, its a sales tactic to rid yourself of a problem client without ending the relationship on bad terms. Or do you think the best approach would be to tell someone off and shut them down by denying them service, etc?! Come on now, you aren't naive enough to believe the latter, right?

[boonrawdcnx]

I am glad that I come from a country with an embassy in Bangkok who cares for its citizens living in Thailand.

Would you care to share what embassy that is ? Might be mine and I don’t k is about it !


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[MyFriend You]

8 hours ago, Khaeng Mak said:

After many decades here. These new rules may indeed tear me from my family and leave me to fend for my self at a time in my life when I am most vulnerable and need their support.  It is clear there is no thought given to humanitarian issues every time each of these recent changes have been cooked up. Expat retirees in Thailand are now viewed as nothing more than a revenue stream. 

 

I have done every one of my extensions myself.  Each one by the rules and never using an agent. I have spent countless amounts of money (and time) to support my family and other people in the community.

 

But, despite all of this, the decision of whether or not I will be torn from my family comes down to a bank account balance. And, if that balance falls just 1 satang below the required 400thb amount, my family life is destroyed. 

 

Expat retirees living in Thailand are currently under siege. Unfortunately many do not yet realize it.

 

Many years ago I was split between retiring in Indonesia or Thailand. In hindsight (a worthless commodity) I was a fool to chose Thailand.

 

I read last year that the Indonesian government now offers a 25 YEAR visa to expats that marry an Indonesian girl. The only requirement to apply is that the newly weds must have already been together for a year.

 

As fate would have it, I came to Thailand and fell in love with my beautiful Sawan. Now I find my life balancing upon the edge of a bottomless abyss. And an error of just 1 satang will cause me to topple in.

I lived in Indonesia for 3 years and you are correct, there are several long term Visa's available, but the long term marraige visa is not open to all who do not convert to Islam, and are under the guidance of an Imam for a term not less than 222 days - where that comes from is beyond us..........I had four Americans working for me that married Indonesian ladies and it was not that easy, as it is in Thailand to get married.........I also know several expats that are single, happy and working in Indonesia as Stock Brokers..........the IDX stock market is better then the SET.

[Dumbastheycome]

I seriously  can not believe that there are those that believe that to  maintain an account balance of  400,000 baht to continue a retirement situation in a foreign  country that initially requires very little else are genuinely  compromised.

 

[tingtongtourist]

Many people saying the goal posts mooving etc etc

but really the rules been that way all along

Its just that to many been getting away with lying on the income affadavit statement for so long and also getting agents to doing the dirty work.

 

A long stayer who been here many years but cant afford 800k,  its really just telling to Thai imms this: 

1. they lie about income.

2. they working illegally.

3. they paying agents to falsify earning/bank statement.

 

but really, if you cant scrape up $30-35k now

then how can you support yourself in short term future or then at older age????