Phuket Immigration: Extend COVID visas early to avoid rush

[snoop1130]

Photo: The Phuket News

 

PHUKET:-- The Phuket Immigration Office has called for all foreigners staying on 60-day ‘COVID visas’ to extend them early to avoid overloading the office with last-minute applications, as experienced last week.

 

The call follows surreal scenes at the main Phuket Immigration Office in Phuket Town last Thursday (Mar 25), when scores of foreigners arrived en masse to have their 60-day so-called ‘COVID visas’ extended so they could continue their stay in the country.

 

The call for foreigners to extend their 60-day visas early also follows Immigration Bureau Commission Lt Gen Somphong Chingduang yesterday (Mar 30) issuing a notice to all immigration offices in the country to continue extending 60-day ‘COVID visas’ until at least May 29.

 

Full Story: https://www.thephuketnews.com/phuket-immigration-extend-covid-visas-early-to-avoid-rush-79521.php

 

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[skatewash]

I suspect that if there were no stories of people going to extend early who received the new extension of stay from the date of application rather than at the end of their existing permission to stay, then there would probably not be a mob scene.

Likewise, if it were announced earlier than the day of expiration that the covid-19 extension policy was being extended for another two months, then there would probably not be a mob scene at immigration.

And finally, if there were no statements and hints from immigration that this was the "last time" covid-19 extensions would be sold, then maybe there might not be a mob scene at immigration.

In other words, immigration has the power to influence whether or not there will be a mob scene at immigration when the covid-19 extension policy officially comes to an end.  Through their actions they have induced people who were already on a covid-19 extension to not wait for their permission of stay to expire but to go to immigration early (and lose days of permission to stay they have previously purchased) on or just before March 30 because they could not know that the covid-19 extension policy would be continued past that date.

The carrot and stick principle would seem to suggest that you get the behavior you reward and you don't get the behavior you punish.  If the mob scenes are a problem for immigration the ball is definitely in their court.

[PST]

May 29th is a Saturday. So will the 'real' date be Friday 28th, or Monday 31st???.

 

Also, i do not think anyone will 'lose' any days already paid for.

 

“The COVID visa can be extended early within 45 days before the expiry date, just like other visas, but I would like people to come only one to two weeks early because we may need a couple of days to process the extension for some foreigners.