Cabinet okays 9-month visas for foreigners

[NorthernRyland]

3 minutes ago, MRToMRT said:

In truth many farangs (I am not saying you or me) have exactly the same negative views of Thais be they elites or normal joes

The negative feelings I have towards Thais (dangerous driving, soi dogs, burning etc...) is one of the problems I have with Thailand and I factor that into my thinking.

 

If Thailand is not cheap and easy I will say it's not worth it anymore. The elites are trying to sell Thailand like it's Switzerland and so they can demand more red tape and higher prices. I disagree and I'm already working on how to divest from the country going forward.

[elliss]

14 Days , quarantine ..

  Starting @ 20,000 for Thai people.   Foreigner/ farlang , up to 200,000 Thb . 

Sounds , fair enough to me . Thai cultural culture 

[thinktoomuch]

2 minutes ago, genericptr said:

Thai elites simply don't understand who are the types of people that are willing to live in their country

I agree with that.

 

I would also say that I don't think the Thai government has ever spent the time or effort over the last 50 years to truly try to understand their tourism sector, what drives it, who comes to Thailand and their financial situation.

 

Furthermore I don't think that they have tried to understand tourism around the world in general, how it is changing, who the tourists are and their financial situations.

[Shey420]

Twenty Chinese provinces were free of Covid-19 and had a combined population of around 800 million. If only one percent of them, about 8 million people, visited Thailand they could support the tourism sector, he said.

 

Seems only the Chinese is wanted.

Good luck to thai people because this won't end well.

[andre47]

3 minutes ago, Shey420 said:

Seems only the Chinese is wanted.

Good luck to thai people because this won't end well.

why?

[jbinthai]

I have had a Retirement Visa for 6 years and lived in Thailand for 19 years.  Had to go to the USA to settle husbands estate in March...and have a re- entry stamp....I am still in the USA...Thailand will not let me back in yet.  Have a house and all my belongings there.  Just does not seem fair to let them in and not let me cone home.

[cerox]

1 minute ago, jbinthai said:

I have had a Retirement Visa for 6 years and lived in Thailand for 19 years.  Had to go to the USA to settle husbands estate in March...and have a re- entry stamp....I am still in the USA...Thailand will not let me back in yet.  Have a house and all my belongings there.  Just does not seem fair to let them in and not let me cone home.

You can apply for a special TV soon, I will do the same ????

 

[samsensam]

4 hours ago, worgeordie said:

Might look good on paper, lets see what happens

when they release the terms and conditions.

regards Worgeordie

 

 

not sure how good it looks on paper... 1200 people, say 400 on a plane? so thats 3 plane loads a month... what countries are these three planes coming from? who's going to manage the process? if it's the embassies and consuls expect the same smooth running process and effective communication experienced with the repatriation flights...

 

 

[uberfarang]

59 minutes ago, Peterw42 said:

I dont get why everyone appears to be so negative about this visa, I have 6-8 friends cheering about it.

They can come back to Thailand, they can be here in 2 weeks time, they can quarantine at home, they can stay 9 months.

It coincides with Thai airways starting up charter flights from the major places.

If your friends are from Taiwan, Korea, or some of the very few countries (if any) that Thailand considers to have "the covid situation under control", then good for them. Otherwise they can stop cheering, they won't be eligible either I'm afraid.

 

With their 1 billion bahts spending per month for 1200 tourists (if there was no typo in those articles), they are clearly targeting some rich (Chinese?) VIP. It makes no sense to make so much noise if the goal is just to let in average joes. A few weeks ago they were targeting 200,000 new tourists for the rest of the year, now they are down to 3600? Hope they really spend that much to compensate for the hundreds of thousands that are about to leave.

[brucec64]

3 hours ago, Zikomat said:

I don't want to take part in dodgy schemes like fake education or volunteer visas. I am not a criminal.

You could actually go to school and then nothing dodgy about it.

[Susco]

5 hours ago, Jonathan Fairfield said:

provided they can prove they have spent 14 days in quarantine.

I can imagine the queue of tourists gonna be very long for that

[Ganesh108]

24 minutes ago, samsensam said:

 

not sure how good it looks on paper... 1200 people, say 400 on a plane? so thats 3 plane loads a month... what countries are these three planes coming from? who's going to manage the process? if it's the embassies and consuls expect the same smooth running process and effective communication experienced with the repatriation flights...

 

 

It's not a business model I would have faith in - too much fuss for too little gain. In normal times, 1200 people would have landed at Suvarnabhumi every 30 minutes. And all you needed were some 15-20 immigration staff to process them. Now you have embassies (dis)organizing the flights, to catch them you may need another domestic or, say, inter-European flight, then comes the quarantine, hotels staffed by people in spacemen suits ... Lord have mercy.

 

If this thing works out in any sensible fashion, I'll eat my solar topi. 

 

 

 

Edited September 15, 2020 by Ganesh108

[Peterw42]

Do people really think there are hundreds of thousands of tourists still here on the amnesty. Hundreds of thousands who can go on a two week holiday in April and still afford to be here in September ? All those independently wealthy people who dont need to return to a home, job, family.

 

 

[Jeffro008]

5 hours ago, Ludo55 said:

Why, you've already had a free 6 months. That new Visa has to be applied for outside of Thailand. Go home and apply the same as everyone else!!

do not leave omg and do not panic thanks and not like everyone else omg

 

[redwood1]

4 minutes ago, Ganesh108 said:

In normal times, 1200 people would have landed at Suvarnabhumi every 30 minutes. And all you needed were some 15-20 immigration staff to process them.

 

 

 

I think there were easily 1200 people ahead of me in the immigration line at Suvarnabhumi airport a few times when I landed.....

[redwood1]

4 minutes ago, Peterw42 said:

Do people really think there are hundreds of thousands of tourists still here on the amnesty. Hundreds of thousands who can go on a two week holiday in April and still afford to be here in September ? All those independently wealthy people who dont need to return to a home, job, family.

 

 

There are still a fair number of under 50 looking guys hanging in Pattaya...I have no idea how they able to stay here so long......Sure some maybe independently wealthy but I really doubt all of them are....

[Neeranam]

1 hour ago, polpott said:

And I think I said the majority of posters haven't worked in Thailand.

No, you never. You said "Or possibly they believe the bar stool fact that you're ineligible if you haven't worked and paid tax here."

• ". 

[Jeffro008]

4 hours ago, tomazbodner said:

Thailand does have ways for people to stay here long time.

 

If you're over 50, you can put 800k in bank account and apply for retirement extensions, provided you keep that in the bank all the time, or at least most of the time.

If you're married, you can put 400k in the bank account and apply for a marriage extension. If you are working with work permit on top of that, you can also apply for Thai citizenship.

If you are partner of PR holder, you can apply for extension based on PR holder.

If you are a parent of a Thai child, you can apply for extension based on that.

If you have a decent job in Thailand, you can apply for extension based on work permit, and if you hold same job for 2+ years, apply for PR. And if you keep PR for 5 years, you can apply for Thai citizenship.

And there are more of these, but all of them have something in common: they are for people who bring value to the country and are not a burden to it. Like every other country, Thailand doesn't want people that will be a burden on society.

 

I don't understand why people who are willing to spend nothing and do nothing, and are only sitting and waiting, hoping for a miracle, expect Thai government to do something for them, while at the same time they can't find one good word for this government and keep on spitting on forces in power and repeat how stupid they are?

 

Scrap together whatever is required for extension of stay, or stop complaining and accept you just don't belong here. There are flights out of Thailand every day.

Absolutly totally agree and most can be more active to find out ourselves prior to wispers of the REAL ongoings and things you should do when or not, ok, thanks 

[impulse]

5 hours ago, ThomasThBKK said:

1200 tourists a month, but retirees etc are still not allowed to come back? .... 

Elite visa has a lousy quota of like 250 a month or so...

 

Absurdity. 

 

1200 tourists a month won't make a difference anyway... 

 

Sure it will.  According to the story in the source that can't be linked, it is expected to generate 1 billion baht a month.  Some quick math says that's over $27K (USD) a head.  Hmmmmmm.

 

A little more math says that 1200 a month times the maximum 9 months that the program allows will only boost tourism by 10,800 walking ATM's at any given time.  About 2 hour's worth of pre-Covid arrivals, when 100,000 tourists arrived every day.

 

I guess if they let in 1200 a month forever and none of them go home for their entire allotted 270 days, they'll eventually be generating 1 billion baht a month at $3K USD per month a head.  But it won't make much of a dent.

 

Maybe you're right...  Absurdity.

 

[polpott]

4 minutes ago, Neeranam said:

No, you never. You said "Or possibly they believe the bar stool fact that you're ineligible if you haven't worked and paid tax here."

• ". 

 

3 hours ago, polpott said:

More likely, the majority of posters aren't eligible.

 

[Cabradelmar]

Well it all comes down to details and how it will be administered... Previous experiences say this will be a bit of a mess. 

[Mr Meeseeks]

Wonderful watching this Thai clowning and ridiculous idiocy. 

 

A joy to behold in their utter and total incompetence. 

 

Enjoy it. 

 

 

[NorthernRyland]

8 minutes ago, redwood1 said:

There are still a fair number of under 50 looking guys hanging in Pattaya...I have no idea how they able to stay here so long......Sure some maybe independently wealthy but I really doubt all of them are....

Immigration doesn't know either. Online revenue, interest on loans, family money, large savings which were acquired over years. Basically enough to live in Thailand but not enough to live back home and not enough to part with the 15k USD for the elite visa. This is probably just 1% of all the ways.

[Jeffro008]

2 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Wonderful watching this Thai clowning and ridiculous idiocy. 

 

A joy to behold in their utter and total incompetence. 

 

Enjoy it. 

 

 

you should study more on cultures to understand more prior to your comment here <deleted>

[PatOngo]

10 minutes ago, polpott said:

 

More likely, the majority of posters aren't eligible.

Define eligible in a public forum! ????

[Jeffro008]

13 minutes ago, Mr Meeseeks said:

Wonderful watching this Thai clowning and ridiculous idiocy. 

 

A joy to behold in their utter and total incompetence. 

 

Enjoy it. 

 

 

try another statements or comments please

 

[Pattaya46]

1 hour ago, elliss said:

14 Days , quarantine ..

Starting @ 20,000 for Thai people.   Foreigner/ farlang , up to 200,000 Thb . 

Sounds , fair enough to me . Thai cultural culture 

What's the point to compare the highest price for farangs to the lowest for Thai?

What about the reverse? 

[VBF]

36 minutes ago, redwood1 said:

There are still a fair number of under 50 looking guys hanging in Pattaya...I have no idea how they able to stay here so long......Sure some maybe independently wealthy but I really doubt all of them are....

Presumably either married to Thais, or taking advantage of the "amnesty".

Perhaps the same observation in a month might show fewer?

[Jeffro008]

6 hours ago, Ludo55 said:

Why, you've already had a free 6 months. That new Visa has to be applied for outside of Thailand. Go home and apply the same as everyone else!!

why do you say this ?

[Orient Express]

Lots of red herrings being thrown around here.

 

The number of hotels applying for the ASQ scheme will no doubt increase as the number of customers increases, as it has done over the past few months. At the same time, prices will become more competitive. My price point would be about EUR 1k (so about THB 37k) for the two weeks quarantine period. Currently, there are 15 out of the 68 hotels in Bangkok at or below this price. When I last looked – about 2 months ago - there were probably only about 3 out of a list of 20 hotels at this price.

 

There are several of international flights currently operating to BKK. I think Qatar Airways, for example, has flown daily throughout. Currently, they are not allowed to fly passengers into Bangkok – they fly freight in and passengers and freight out – but it wouldn’t take much to change that. If, on the other hand, the Thai government insists on the “new tourists” only using the Thai Airways repatriation flights, there will be a problem.

 

I don’t understand this fixation with the USD 100k insurance policy. Most travel insurance policies (at least ex- Europe) have adjusted to include Covid-19 and cover health expenses for a much larger figure than USD 100k (usually in the millions). The related insurance premiums are still generally at the same level as pre-Covid. I don’t think the Thai government is insisting on a Thai insurance policy for tourists, is it?

 

These are all technicalities which can be easily sorted. The more important – and difficult – issue to resolve, will be managing public reaction (hysteria?) when – as will happen – one or more of these tourists is found to be infected after release from quarantine. Hopefully, someone in the Thai government is planning for this.