Tourist Visa For Thai Wife To Go To Australia

[Mobi]

If there has been recent thread on this, please point me in the right direction.

I have a friend who lives in Brisbane, and he has invited me and my Thai wife there for a two week holiday.

My wife has previously been with me on a holiday to the UK, and she obtained a visa to go there with no problems. We live in Thailand.

We will both need visas for Oz.

Will it be a major hassle for her? Will she need guarantors? will she need to show bank accounts, be interviewed and all that jazz?

If it's all too much I won't bother.

Thanks for any advice.

Mobi

[Mighty Mouse]

Mobi D'Ark, we'd love you to come Down Under and pay us a visit. Both you and your wife may then realise why we Aussies get so much joy out of Pommie Bashing.

Have a look through this link. Click on 'visa options' and read about 'tourist visas.'

I'm assuming you have sufficient funds to financially support yourselves whilst in Australia, so any tourist visa application should be quite easy for you.

If your friend needs to support your application, there are plenty of threads in the forum that give information on those requirements.

If you have any other questions, you only need to ask.

[Mobi]

Thanks for the link Mighty Mouse.

Having worked for an Aussie company for over 15 years, and travelled extensively in OZ, I know all about Pommie bashing Amazing the number of Aussies who come to Pommie land to live and work though. Must be something there they like

Me, I prefer LOS, so won't start WW3 over it.

Back on topic, does anyone have specific experience of Thai wives applying for tourist visas at the Aussie embassy in BKK? I live in Pattaya, so don't want to make more trips than necessary, so for warned is for armed so to speak.

Thanks

[Mobi]

I found the Aussie Thailand embassy website.

Bloody great!

It says that some outfit called Australian Visa Application Centre will process the application. It also sates there are 6 centres throughout Thailand. I have looked and clicked till I am blue in the face, but the only address listed is the one in BKK, despite the statement: "Australian Visa Application Centre in Bangkok or at their nearest of the six selected GDA courier centres across Thailand.

I have clicked on about a dozen different links on visa fees , but they are only quoted in Aussie Dollars, despite the fact that elsewhere on the website they advise the fees are payable by Bankers' draft in Thai Baht.

I have clicked on many links to download the visa application form 84R. but everytime I get an error message - not available.

Not a promising start. Maybe I won't bother.

[gburns57au]

Thanks for the link Mighty Mouse.

Having worked for an Aussie company for over 15 years, and travelled extensively in OZ, I know all about Pommie bashing Amazing the number of Aussies who come to Pommie land to live and work though. Must be something there they like

Me, I prefer LOS, so won't start WW3 over it.

Back on topic, does anyone have specific experience of Thai wives applying for tourist visas at the Aussie embassy in BKK? I live in Pattaya, so don't want to make more trips than necessary, so for warned is for armed so to speak.

Thanks

We did have someone else on here do the same thing with success.

Go to the VFS office together and apply at the same time so they know you are travelling together. There maybe some questions over the phone but it is unlikely that a face to face interview will be required, so it should only take two trips to BKK, one for the application and one to pick up the passports.

I suggest in agreement with MM that the financial aspect is the one they would look at in your case....A letter from your company stating that you have leave and a job to return to would assist.

[Mighty Mouse]

Not a promising start. Maybe I won't bother.

:D

Your Pommie cricket team gave up with out much of a fight, not you too.

The VFS Office is on the 34th floor in the Thai CC Tower, Bangkok is very easy to find. It is right alongside the Surasak BTS station.

It would be to your advantage to have your application properly completed before you get there. The VFS staff are not all that bright and if something is amiss, they will refuse to take the document that contains the error. This could result in you having to go away and start all over again.

The average time it takes from the time your application is accepted at the VFS office, to the time your passports are returned from the Oz Embassy for collection by you, is five days.

You can track the progress of your passports on the VFS office internet link. The first stage is acceptance of passports by VFS. The second stage is passports being sent to the Embassy. The third stage is passports awaiting collection at the VFS office.

You won't know whether you have been granted the visa until you pick up the passports. The VFS won't tell you over the phone.

Should there be something further that the Embassy require regarding the application, they will contact you.

If you haven't heard anything from them in the five day period, you can generally rest assured that the visas have been granted.

If you have any inquiries that you may wish to ask the Embassy, don't waste your time writing to the email addy as listed on the Australian Embassy web site. They don't answer any emails however, they do provide an Embassy representative who will answer questions at the VFS office.

According to the VFS web page, this representative will be available between 2pm and 4pm Tuesday and Thursday. Don't believe that either. If you try to phone this representative at 2pm, you will get a long winded recorded message that states the representative will be available from 2.30pm.

I did warn you that the staff are not all that bright.

It will require two visits only. One to submit the application, the second to pick up your passports and visas. Don't risk having them sent by mail.

[Mobi]

Not a promising start. Maybe I won't bother.

:D

Your Pommie cricket team gave up with out much of a fight, not you too.

Um.... I assume you're not talking about the recent one day matches?...

Thanks for your input ( and gburns57 au.)

I'm not really giving up - well not yet anyway - just a bit pissed off.

Yes, I need to take the completed forms with me - but - I can't download them from either the Aussie or the VFS websites. The link doesn't work. No idea why - I've tried and tried - keep getting error messages.

Maybe they're revising the form to keep out poms.

[Mighty Mouse]

Mobi,

I have no problem in downloading the 48R Form from my computer.

Are you using a Pommie computer???

Disregard what I said in my previous post about mailing passports. The VFS will only forward them by their trusted courier service to certain locations. They don't use the ordinary mail service.

[Peht]

I got tourist Visa for my GF no problem earlier this month, I'm from UK she's Thai, been outside Thailand once to HKG with me last year. The staff at the visa centre were fine. Don't expect an opinion from them though, their job seems to be just to make sure the application is in order and forward it to the embassy. One phone call from Embassy to my GF to check she knew my name and a few other personal details and all was OK.

Most important thing, as ever, is to have plenty of documentation supporting the application & of course sufficient funds to keep them happy.

Not sure whether to do a trip from Brisbane to Cairns or fly into Darwin and tour some of NT, I'm a bit worried north QLD will be a bit similar to here ie tropical climate.

[gburns57au]

Mobi, if you are in Pattaya you will have to use the BKK office at the address given by MM....there are regional offices that will accept applications but these are far flung.

The BKK office has the forms there and you can fill them in at the time of application. meantime look at the Oz Immi forms on the site and make sure that you have the info correct...also try printing them direct from the site rather than D/L....If you have a problem...let me know.

[Mobi]

Thanks for the advice everyone.

I don't know why my bloody computer wouldn't download the forms, I tried on my 2nd Pc and downloaded them straight away. Got me very pissed off and I only finally succeeded in downloading off the first PC when I un-installed Adobe Acrobat and used Foxit to download. All very strange as I use adobe regularly and no problems on any other sites.

Anyway, I guess I get the forms filled in and we'll go up to BKK and submit them. I'm retired, so no employment letters, but I should be able to satisfy them on my financial standing, hopefully.

We only want to spend a couple of weeks on the Gold coast:blink: