I finally meandered over to http://www.thaiimmigration.com -- and it's a heck of an effort, especially since its only one immigration office (Nongkhai), not immigration headquarters. But they do state they're presenting Thai immigration law per se, not Nongkhai interpretation. Maybe somewhat hard for them not to get subjective, but they do seem legit, and another good source of information in addition to this forum.

Anyway, I found the below thread very interesting, although somewhat hot hearted.

http://www.thaiimmigration.com/inv/index.php?showtopic=82

The Nongkhai webmaster says the Phuket Gazette is all wet, that their recent report from an Immigration Captain was incorrect, namely you COULD indeed use a mix of income and bank account holdings to meet visa extension requirements. The Captain was quoted as saying 'one or the other, not both.' The Phuket Gazette responds at the end of the thread. Not certain whether the Captain was misquoted, misinformed -- or reads Thai law differently than Nongkhai.

Would be interesting to see if the Phuket Gazette can get a response from the Captain about Nongkhai's assertion.

Click on the other links in that thread. It becomes a lot clearer how the confusion on 'grandfathering' occured.

Give me Nong Khai over Phuket any day

mind you i have never been to Phuket

It is high time Suan Phlu stepped in an laid down exactly what the rules are!!

At the moment it is a total mess

From my newbie status as someone who has been to Bangkok and will be moving to Thailand to marry a Thai lady next year, my take on this issue is that asking for immigration to resolve this confusion would result in too much loss of "face". Maybe the officer in Phuket mis-spoke about combining bank balance with income, or maybe the quote was garbled or mangled. I have found that I do not get clear answers to my questions when I ask a Thai an "either/or" question - when I ask my Thai gf or her family if they like this or that, the answer is usually not direct. But I get off the point - face. There will be too much loss of face for regional immigration to disagree over placing blame and reprimand.

If anything, immigration will discuss this behind closed doors and we may never know the answer.

Just my 3 baht .....

ragtime3