Lost Passport due to agent witholding

[scubascuba3]

4 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

Is it an agent with a shop? rather than some bloke.

 

If it's a proper established shop offer to pay more, they can turn them around in 3 days

Op, this is how it works sometimes, if agents\immigration are busy you may need to wait. It's happened to me. Keep chasing the agent for an ETA

[Peter Denis]

I cannot help wondering if there is more to this story.

Every sane person would have chased the agent on a daily basis in the last week preceding the expiry of the Visa.

For sure, I would have insisted on returning my passport - Visa or not - during the final days before expiry.

But after x weeks of promises not kept, the friend of the OP is now in a dreadful position, and every day this continues it becomes more grave.

This situation cannot endure. Before going to the police (don't go to immigration), provide the agent with an ultimatum and make it clear that your patience is over.

 

[orchis]

I think the agent lost your passport.

[NanLaew]

8 hours ago, DannyCarlton said:

Yes, an actual visa. I paid 45k but that included also getting a 12 month extension tagged on to it. Gave the agent my passport, 2 weeks later was returned with non O valid for 3 months plus 12 months extension (retirement) giving me a total of 15 months permission to stay. I never left Pattaya.

Apart from the obvious 'because you can', precisely why did you do this?

[MarcB]

Go to the local police station, say you forgot your bag in a taxi, and your passport was in it.

Explain that no taxi driver has contacted the news yet to return your bag.

 

The police issues a letter that says "passport lost".

They cannot check the validity of your visa, since you dont have a passport.

 

Give that letter to the embassy.

They give you an emergency travel document, which you can use to leave the country.

There is also no visa validity on that document.

I guess at the airport they will not check you are on overstay, but maybe they can/will.

So you might have to pay the fee. I dont know that.

 

If you are registered in thailand as residing in the country by your embassy, you could apply for a new passport instead of the emergency document,

But then at immigration they will check your overstay while you apply for a 30 day approval of stay to be stamped in the new passport, and you will also have to pay the fee.

[dcnx]

13 hours ago, bbi1 said:

I guess this post serves as a lesson for all those people on ThaiVisa who likes using Agents to bribe IO's. Don't use Agents unless you wanna gamble with having a lost passport ????

Used agents for nearly 20 years without a hitch. I have better things to do with my life than stand in lines, deal with immigration, or risk not getting my visa. Thailand is a nation of prostitutes and doesn't just mean bar girls, immigration is also for sale and I’m happy to pay to play. It’s the Thai way. 

 

The problem comes when people don’t use agents with a long history of excellent work or they try to cut corners and use some guy that their bar hooker GF knows.

Edited November 29, 2019 by dcnx

[wayned]

13 hours ago, anchadian said:

An extension yes but not an actual VISA

I've had 5 real visas issued while I was in Thailand back in the late 1990s and early 2000s when it was "legal".  I was living in Samui and used a travel agent in Nathion to get them, all issued in Penang and I've never been in Penang in my life.  There were three double entry tourist visas followed by two double entry, yes double entry. Non "O", visas before I got with it and got a marriage extension They cost about 6500 baht each and were cheaper than traveling to Penang and doing it yourself.  In those days when I went to Sadao to activate the  second entry, there were agents at the checkpoint with stacks of passports. You could even get them to activate the second entry for you for about 1200 baht, actually cheaper than the bus to Hat Yai , a taxi to the border and an overnight and bus back the next day. I don't know if the service is still  available but, if it is, it would be definitely at a increased cost.  When I left Samui in 2003 the prices of everything had gotten ridiculous especially the lease on the bar I had on Soi Green Mango in Chaweng.

[farangchuma]

15 hours ago, bbi1 said:

I guess this post serves as a lesson for all those people on ThaiVisa who likes using Agents to bribe IO's. Don't use Agents unless you wanna gamble with having a lost passport

Have used agents multiple times without any issue. 

Edited November 29, 2019 by farangchuma

[Vacuum]

16 hours ago, pookondee said:

After this whole ordeal, i would be inclined to exit Thailand back door at some quiet border in Isaan..

Fly international back to home from a neighbouring country and get a real visa there..

...without a passport?

[pookondee]

11 minutes ago, Vacuum said:

...without a passport?

That was a suggestion for if/when when he gets it back.

[RichardColeman]

Isn't a condition of applying for a visa having at least some time left on the passport ? If not , it should be.

[DannyCarlton]

8 hours ago, NanLaew said:

Apart from the obvious 'because you can', precisely why did you do this?

Complete newbie on visas (hadn't discovered TV back then). Had been refused an O-A at the embassy in London and was panicking about my 6 week TV expiring. Just wanted it sorted.

[cnx355]

20 hours ago, Tropicalevo said:

As I see it, your friend has three choices.

1 report the passport as lost at a police station. Take the police report to the embassy and ask for a temporary travel document. Go back to their home country and obtain a replacement. There will be restriction on the replacement in case the original passport surfaces. Usually only valid for one year but it depends on the country.

2 Stay quite. Do not go out and pray like buuggery that the passport finally tuns up.

3 Report the agent to the police and say that the passport has been stolen.

I know which option I would take.

I would chose number 3 , but after I visit the agent and tell him I will report the passport lost while in his possession, unless he can get it back now. I will tell him that the police report is necessary to have a new passport.  I hope the agent you used gave you a receipt of the payment you did to him as a proof he has your passport.. If you have no  receipt as a proof the agent has the passport , I will only report the passport lost with no details and be ready to have Immigration problems.

[chrissables]

20 hours ago, anchadian said:

An extension yes but not an actual VISA

You extend a visa. The stamp in your passport confirming that is a visa.

[lopburi3]

4 minutes ago, chrissables said:

You extend a visa. The stamp in your passport confirming that is a visa.

No it is not a visa - it is the permitted to stay stamp.

[chrissables]

3 minutes ago, lopburi3 said:

No it is not a visa - it is the permitted to stay stamp.

Look up the legal definition of a visa. It's the stamp allowing you to stay. The type is not important, be retirement, marriage or extension of. The stamp is a visa.

[Peterw42]

12 minutes ago, chrissables said:

You extend a visa. The stamp in your passport confirming that is a visa.

You extend a stay, not a visa. Thats why you need a re-entry permit to re-enter. If you still had a valid extended visa then you wouldn't need a re-entry permit.

Nobody has ever extended a visa, either inside or outside of thailand.

A Visa is an entry document and generates a stay.

 

6 minutes ago, chrissables said:

Look up the legal definition of a visa. It's the stamp allowing you to stay. The type is not important, be retirement, marriage or extension of. The stamp is a visa.

The stamp is an extension of stay, see below, it says extension of stay not extension of visa.

 

[chrissables]

35 minutes ago, Peterw42 said:

You extend a stay, not a visa. Thats why you need a re-entry permit to re-enter. If you still had a valid extended visa then you wouldn't need a re-entry permit.

Nobody has ever extended a visa, either inside or outside of thailand.

A Visa is an entry document and generates a stay.

 

The stamp is an extension of stay, see below, it says extension of stay not extension of visa.

 

The definition is a visa. A stamp or seal allowing you to stay is a visa. Semantics i know ????

 

 

[steve187]

21 hours ago, GalaxyMan said:

Not true. I got my Non-O while in Thailand, though I had to pay an agent 35,000 baht to make it happen.

so not straight forward then, 2,000 baht for a non imm 'O' visa as part of a conversion process, so 33,000 baht for what

[NanLaew]

2 hours ago, DannyCarlton said:

Complete newbie on visas (hadn't discovered TV back then). Had been refused an O-A at the embassy in London and was panicking about my 6 week TV expiring. Just wanted it sorted.

When painted into that corner by the petty bureaucracy that is Thai Immigration, in your case I can see where the efficacy of the agent was necessary.

[NoshowJones]

21 hours ago, bbi1 said:

I guess this post serves as a lesson for all those people on ThaiVisa who likes using Agents to bribe IO's. Don't use Agents unless you wanna gamble with having a lost passport ????

The majority of agents are OK, I have only ever came across one crooked agent, I cannot name him for obvious reasons.

[NanLaew]

26 minutes ago, chrissables said:

The definition is a visa. A stamp or seal allowing you to stay is a visa. Semantics i know

Glossing over the precise definition of visa versus extension of stay as determined by Thai Immigration can lead to incorrect advice, wrong assumptions and an imperiled right to stay in the country.

 

Unless it is a multi-entry visa, it EXPIRES on the date and time it is used to gain entry. The clue to this is the large, red "USED" that the IO typically affixes to the aforementioned visa before he hands your passport back.

[buick]

42 minutes ago, chrissables said:

The definition is a visa. A stamp or seal allowing you to stay is a visa. Semantics i know

it allows you entry for a certain period of time (a 90 day non imm O as an example, gives you 90 day stay).  but when you want to extend that 'stay period', the visa is not extended.  you are extending your 'permission to stay'.

 

if you get a new passport, visas are not required to be transferred from the old to the new.  but extensions of stay are transferred from the old to the new. 

 

edit:

in the bottom of the picture where it says 'to keep your stay permit', it would say 'to keep your visa permit' if it was actually a visa.  single entry visas are cancelled upon entry and at that point you are on a 'permission to stay', not a visa.

Edited November 30, 2019 by buick

[Prince77]

Did I get anything wrong? The passport is with the Agent who is in default of returning it. I would go to the Police and visit the Agent together with them. Problem solved.

[BritTim]

18 minutes ago, Prince77 said:

Did I get anything wrong? The passport is with the Agent who is in default of returning it. I would go to the Police and visit the Agent together with them. Problem solved.

If willing to pay the police, that might work. However, beware. The agent may well be able to outbid you, and you could end up in a world of hurt. Recognise that agents often have very good connections.

[allenberg]

1 hour ago, chrissables said:

The definition is a visa. A stamp or seal allowing you to stay is a visa. Semantics i know ????

 

 

A visa allows you to cross the border during its valid dates. Permission to stay is granted, or not, when you present said visa to the border authority.

[moe666]

23 hours ago, GalaxyMan said:

Not true. I got my Non-O while in Thailand, though I had to pay an agent 35,000 baht to make it happen.

well no you could have done it yourself, that conversion is a normal activity of immigration

[moe666]

It sounds like the friend was doing something illigal like sending his passport out of country for a visa.

[DJ54]

Avoid pissing in someone’s Wheaties... Go to the office where

your agent works. Explain to whom ever is there what you need 

and hopefully get results. 

 

If yiu decide to report it leave the country and I’d think long and hard about coming back if you had to throw someone under the bus....

[Max69xl]

On 11/29/2019 at 12:28 PM, GalaxyMan said:

Not true. I got my Non-O while in Thailand, though I had to pay an agent 35,000 baht to make it happen.

You don't need an agent for a 90 days Non-Immigrant O Visa in Thailand. You just convert a 60 days TR Visa or a 30 days Visa exempt at the local immigration office. The cost is 2000 baht.