Story Of My Thai Citizenship Application

[greenchair]

30 minutes ago, Arkady said:

 

The attached form for witnesses who are asked to verify applicants' behaviour and assets attached clearly has spaces for them to fill in their profession, position and monthly salary.  Mine had to fill in and sign this form and one of them nearly dropped out of this process because she didn't want the other witness, whom she knew, to see her salary.  I had to reassure her that I would keep both forms absolutely separate and confidential. 

 

Your experience might have been different, since you applied to adopt your husband's Thai nationality which is a quite different process with different requirements from applying for naturalisation under Section 10 which is what most people in this thread are doing or have done.

 

Witness form TH.pdfWitness form TH.pdf

Not that I want to disagree. The documents required to submit are copies of .. ..

1.ID card. 

2.house book 

3.letter from job with the letterhead of the company. 

4.must know the foreigner for 5 years. 

5. Cannot be a family member of another witness or of the applicant. 

There's no other documents needed. 

Though there is a small space to put the salary recieved. It is a minor formality and irrelevant to the process. 

It is nothing to do with citizenship through marriage, everyone does this standard and easy part of the process. 

Relax. 

[DashRye]

If he is from Israel he can now visit the Muslim countries that were off-limits with an Israeli passport, such as Malaysia.
If he is American he can reduce his risk of trouble in whatever country has anti-US riots...

Love this comment.

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[new101]

Not sure if my post was missed? Thanks:

 

Looking for a bit of advise.

 

Me - Married and working in Thailand for 5 years, have WP paid taxes and Non O extended BASED ON THAI CHILD living with me - had the same extension for 4 years. No marriage extension even though I am married.

 

Wife - Working abroad coming back in 6 months full time.

 

Can I apply based on marriage when shes back?

[GabbaGabbaHey]

2 hours ago, new101 said:

Not sure if my post was missed? Thanks:

Looking for a bit of advise.

Me - Married and working in Thailand for 5 years, have WP paid taxes and Non O extended BASED ON THAI CHILD living with me - had the same extension for 4 years. No marriage extension even though I am married.

Wife - Working abroad coming back in 6 months full time.

Can I apply based on marriage when shes back?

I'm not an expert, just an applicant being in the process of naturalization based on marriage at the moment. What I can say from your description is that I don't see something that would prevent it. Of course there are other factors you don't mention that could block you, but I assume you meet the minimum salary income (min 40,000 baht per month if you're married I think), your level and knowledge of Thai language and culture (for the points calculation), having several charity donation receipts for the past years, your education level and other stuff. The best is probably to look at the points system to have an idea if you can meet the required 50/100 points. This can also help you identify any blocking aspect.

 

[SAMCHAROEN]

Hi folks
I had applied for Thai citizenship since 6 years ago, but no news as yet.
Last week my wife (Thai) went to meet the officer at RTP and they basically have asked to re-submit all documents.
One of the required documents is proof of money in the bank not less than 60k.
We checked with them again to clearify wether the money should be in a savings or Fixed deposit account and the officer said it could be in either.
I would like to know your advice from your experience which would be more preferable to show as eveidence - money in savings account or in fixed deposit account?
Thanks in advance.


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[Arkady]

57 minutes ago, SAMCHAROEN said:

Hi folks
I had applied for Thai citizenship since 6 years ago, but no news as yet.
Last week my wife (Thai) went to meet the officer at RTP and they basically have asked to re-submit all documents.
One of the required documents is proof of money in the bank not less than 60k.
We checked with them again to clearify wether the money should be in a savings or Fixed deposit account and the officer said it could be in either.
I would like to know your advice from your experience which would be more preferable to show as eveidence - money in savings account or in fixed deposit account?
Thanks in advance.
 

 

Did the officer say what happened to the original application you submitted 6 years ago?  Was this the first time you followed up on it? 

 

It doesn't matter at all what kind of bank account you show the balance in.  They need a letter from the bank confirming the balance you have on that particular day. What is very important is how the letter is addressed.  Mine was rejected twice because the bank insisted on doing stupid things like addressing it to the Immigration Bureau, even after I told them Immigration had nothing to do with this process. You need to get the bank to head the letter as follows:

 

เรึ่อง รับรองเงินฟากในบัญชี

เรีอน ผกก. ฝ่ายกฎหมายและวินัย บก. อก. บช.ส.

Re: Confirmation of account balance

To: Naturalization Unit, Legal and Discipline Section,

General Staff Division, Special Branch Bureau

 

And the address is:

ฝ่ายกฎหมายและวินัย บก. อก. บช.ส.

ถนนพระราม 1 แขวงปทุมวัน เขตปทุมวัน

กรุงเทพมหานคร 10330

Naturalization Unit, Legal and Discipline Section,

General Staff Division, Special Branch Bureau,

Rama I Road, Pathum Wan District, Bangkok 10330.

 

 

 

 

 

[SAMCHAROEN]

Thanks Arkady. We started following up with them last year (5 years after application)and came to know that since the taxes I paid in one of the 3 years preceding the application were inadequate, my application is put on “hold”. They informed that the earlier rule was to consider the average tax paid in 3 preceding years but now the new rule was to consider each year individually.

Regarding the bank letter they have asked to address to the RTP citizenship department. Thus, my bank has prepared the letter as below:

[Arkady]

56 minutes ago, SAMCHAROEN said:

Thanks Arkady. We started following up with them last year (5 years after application)and came to know that since the taxes I paid in one of the 3 years preceding the application were inadequate, my application is put on “hold”. They informed that the earlier rule was to consider the average tax paid in 3 preceding years but now the new rule was to consider each year individually.

Regarding the bank letter they have asked to address to the RTP citizenship department. Thus, my bank has prepared the letter as below:

 

The bank addressed it to "Thai Police National Head Quarters Citizenship Department".  They might accept that as it is in the ballpark, although it doesn't mention the official name of the department or even Special Branch.

[jak2002003]

Wow.  Reading through some of this thread I just don't know why anyone would want to get Thai Citizenship.

 

What are the advantages to getting rather then a long term visa.. say an Elite visa?

 

Also, would it be possible to get citizenship as a single young male if you have enough money, can speak, read and write Thai reasonably well too, or its it only for farangs married to Thai women?   

 

 

[NewlyMintedThai]

Read through more of the thread and your questions will all be answered.


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[jak2002003]

1 minute ago, NewlyMintedThai said:

Read through more of the thread and your questions will all be answered.


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Its a massive long thread mate!

 

You know about it all and can answer the questions, and replied to my post.. yet can't be bothered to spend a few seconds to answer me?  Thanks.

[MrPatrickThai]

16 minutes ago, jak2002003 said:

Wow.  Reading through some of this thread I just don't know why anyone would want to get Thai Citizenship.

 

What are the advantages to getting rather then a long term visa.. say an Elite visa?

 

Also, would it be possible to get citizenship as a single young male if you have enough money, can speak, read and write Thai reasonably well too, or its it only for farangs married to Thai women?   

 

 

For starter, with an elite visa you pay something like 1 million baht and still have to do 90 day reporting!!! Citizenship costs  5,000 baht. You can't buy land, vote, do many jobs, own a business fully etc.

 

Yes  young unmarried guys can get it.

 

If you seriously are interested, you will read through the thread. 

[Arkady]

1 hour ago, jak2002003 said:

Wow.  Reading through some of this thread I just don't know why anyone would want to get Thai Citizenship.

 

What are the advantages to getting rather then a long term visa.. say an Elite visa?

 

Also, would it be possible to get citizenship as a single young male if you have enough money, can speak, read and write Thai reasonably well too, or its it only for farangs married to Thai women?   

 

 

If you can't understand why anyone would want to have the citizenship of a country to which they have migrated permanently and in the case of Thai citizenship have the advantages of being able to own your own business, your own landed property, work without a work permit, not need visas & etc, then Thai citizenship is probably not for you. 

 

Thai citizenship is not only for farangs married married to Thai women.  In fact, non-farangs, mainly Asians, who are not married to Thai women account for the majority new naturalisations.   If you are not married to a Thai, you will have to apply for permanent residence first and hold that status for 5 years to eligible to apply for citizenship .  You need to be working with WP and making the minimum required salaries for both PR and citizenship.  You need to show a relatively small bank balance for both.  Other than that it doesn't much matter how much money you have.  What they are looking for how much money you are earning from a job in Thailand and how much tax you have paid.  If you own a Thai condo that can go on the application form but no other assets (Thai equities, overseas  assets etc) are of interest.  

 

Knowledge of Thai language is required for PR and for citizenship (unless you have a Thai spouse).  Even if you have a Thai spouse, you might need a score in the language tests to get the requisite 50/100 points to qualify.  There is language testing and interviews in Thai for both.  The only case you are allowed to use an interpreter in the panel interviews is, if you are married to a Thai and your spouse translates for you or just helps you with the replies. Absolute fluency in Thai is not required.  An intermediate level working knowledge is enough. Reading and writing is not required but the citizenship tests include optional tests of reading and writing for more points.      

[ubonjoe]

Some troll posts with advertising links have been removed.

[jak2002003]

4 hours ago, Arkady said:

If you can't understand why anyone would want to have the citizenship of a country to which they have migrated permanently and in the case of Thai citizenship have the advantages of being able to own your own business, your own landed property, work without a work permit, not need visas & etc, then Thai citizenship is probably not for you. 

 

Thai citizenship is not only for farangs married married to Thai women.  In fact, non-farangs, mainly Asians, who are not married to Thai women account for the majority new naturalisations.   If you are not married to a Thai, you will have to apply for permanent residence first and hold that status for 5 years to eligible to apply for citizenship .  You need to be working with WP and making the minimum required salaries for both PR and citizenship.  You need to show a relatively small bank balance for both.  Other than that it doesn't much matter how much money you have.  What they are looking for how much money you are earning from a job in Thailand and how much tax you have paid.  If you own a Thai condo that can go on the application form but no other assets (Thai equities, overseas  assets etc) are of interest.  

 

Knowledge of Thai language is required for PR and for citizenship (unless you have a Thai spouse).  Even if you have a Thai spouse, you might need a score in the language tests to get the requisite 50/100 points to qualify.  There is language testing and interviews in Thai for both.  The only case you are allowed to use an interpreter in the panel interviews is, if you are married to a Thai and your spouse translates for you or just helps you with the replies. Absolute fluency in Thai is not required.  An intermediate level working knowledge is enough. Reading and writing is not required but the citizenship tests include optional tests of reading and writing for more points.      

Thank you for the reply.  Its very helpful.  

 

I did not realise it only cost 5,000 Baht!  Today is the first day I thought about this thing.. as I saw the thread come up on here... so I apologise for my ignorance of the subject.  

 

Maybe not worth me doing it though, because you say I have to have permanent residence first.. for 5 years... plus the time to apply, and then the time to apply for the citizenship... which reading through this thread seems to take over a year also.  I already own my own house here already, but on the rented land, and I don't have any intention to have a business... and as for voting at the moment lol.

 

I have been here full time 11 years.  Only back to the UK for 7 days for a funeral once in that time.  Would they see that on my passport and class it as permanent residence?  

 

I am 'retired' now, but way under the age of one can get a retirement visa.  So I would have no job, but would have the money and assets already here in Thailand.  Do you think I need to be working, or just having enough money will be enough?  I would love not to have to go to immigration office ever again.. that is a dream!!!  But, for the effort and time I can't justify that as a reason to getting citizenship.. as I only go there once a year anyway.  The TM30 forms are a pain now though.. so will have to go to do them.

 

I am actually reasonably fluent in Thai speaking, reading, and not too bad at writing, although my spelling is really bad.. same as my native English 55.

 

Thanks guys.  You have given me something to think about.  I will look into the permanent residence thing on the web.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to help me with my questions.  

 

 

Edited February 2, 2018 by jak2002003

[GarryP]

2 minutes ago, jak2002003 said:

Thank you for the reply.  Its very helpful.  

 

I did not realise it only cost 5,000 Baht!  Today is the first day I thought about this thing.. as I saw the thread come up on here... so I apologise for my ignorance of the subject.  

 

Maybe not worth me doing it though, because you say I have to have permanent residence first.. for 5 years... plus the time to apply, and then the time to apply for the citizenship... which reading through this thread seems to take over a year also.  I already own my own house here already, but on the rented land, and I don't have any intention to have a business... and as for voting at the moment lol.

 

I have been here full time 11 years.  Only back to the UK for 7 days for a funeral once in that time.  Would they see that on my passport and class it as permanent residence?  

 

I am 'retired' now, but way under the age of one can get a retirement visa.  So I would have no job, but would have the money and assets already here in Thailand.  Do you think I need to be working, or just having enough money will be enough?  I would love not to have to go to immigration office ever again.. that is a dream!!!  But, for the effort and time I can't justify that as a reason to getting citizenship.. as I only go there once a year anyway.  The TM30 forms are a pain now though.. so will have to go to do them.

 

I am actually reasonably fluent in Thai speaking, reading, and not too bad at righting, although my spelling is really bad.. same as my native English 55.

 

Thanks guys.  You have given me something to think about.  I will look into the permanent residence thing on the web.

 

Thanks again for taking the time to help me with my questions.  

 

 

Being employed is a prerequisite.  

[jak2002003]

1 minute ago, GarryP said:

Being employed is a prerequisite.  

That's saved me a lot of time.  So retired people can't get citizenship either, right?

[skyaslimit]

That's saved me a lot of time.  So retired people can't get citizenship either, right?

Right.


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[tangdio]

Is there a minimun required salary that needs to be shown?

thanks guys!

[GabbaGabbaHey]

36 minutes ago, tangdio said:

Is there a minimun required salary that needs to be shown?

thanks guys!

Yes, it's currently 40,000 baht per month for those with Thai wives and 80,000 baht per month for those without Thai wives.

[Neeranam]

On 02/02/2018 at 1:27 PM, VIBE said:

Hi,  what kind of documents did they ask to see?  I gave everything to them in the application, and did not make a copy of it....:(  

Letter from work, work permit, house book, passport, kid and wife's passport and house book, marriage cert. Then luckily I had copies of my translated degree.

[Big Guns]

Has anyone had benefits removed from their employment contract as a result of Thai citizenship e.g flights & bonus. I have an issue with this at the moment. If anyone can PM me with advice as its a bit of a nightmare scenario.

[GabbaGabbaHey]

Has anyone had benefits removed from their employment contract as a result of Thai citizenship e.g flights & bonus. I have an issue with this at the moment. If anyone can PM me with advice as its a bit of a nightmare scenario.

Just a general comment but it does make sense to me that once naturalized one would stop being entitled benefits of an expat in Thailand regarding labor legislation aspects, and consequently I don’t see what would force an employer to keep paying any expat advantages.
When I got my PR, not even citizenship, although my company saved 75% of visa-WP renewal costs, they stopped paying the 5,700 baht for the re-entry stamp which I still needs if I travel outside Thailand -but is not mandatory for a PR holder who remains in The country-, you see. so I expect higher level of this when getting naturalization.


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[skippybangkok]

Just a general comment but it does make sense to me that once naturalized one would stop being entitled benefits of an expat in Thailand regarding labor legislation aspects, and consequently I don’t see what would force an employer to keep paying any expat advantages.
When I got my PR, not even citizenship, although my company saved 75% of visa-WP renewal costs, they stopped paying the 5,700 baht for the re-entry stamp which I still needs if I travel outside Thailand -but is not mandatory for a PR holder who remains in The country-, you see. so I expect higher level of this when getting naturalization.


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Generally according to labour law you cannot take away benefits given without consent of the staff, and if they do not consent , they could be terminated in accordance with the law ( pay out )


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[Arkady]

It depends on the company but generally speaking employers these days pay whatever rate they need to pay to keep quality staff.  I think the exception is people who are asked to move somewhere they don't necessarily want to go on a short term contract for the good of the company.  Obviously they need to offer accommodation and other expat benefits to these staff or no one would go.   

 

In my case, I was a relatively senior expat posted to Thailand in finance when I got PR and my company even paid the fee which was B50,000 in those days, as well as the annual re-entry stamps.  While I was in that job the company took the decision to eliminate all expat benefits and monetised them, so that you got the cash value of your health insurance, biz class tickets home and rent at that point in time.  The move made sense for the business because we needed a lot of senior local staff in HK and Singapore to compete and the expat terms for white guys, most of whom had been hired locally by that stage, understandably put them off and made it harder to hire the best Asian staff.  The only thing they couldn't get rid of was the 6 weeks holiday for anyone hired originally as an expat but the pressures of the business made it hard to use it all up.  When I needed to hire good staff in Thailand I found that the good quality Thais had to be paid a lot more than foreigners able to do the same job and tended to job hop much more.  So I just paid them all what they were worth to the business and enough to prevent competitors from poaching them. Once I had solved the WP problem I ended up hiring more foreigners because they were cheaper,  wrote their own English reports with little need for editing, generally handled foreign clients better on the phone  and stayed longer.

 

I can't understand why a company would remove any part of an employee's remuneration package because they had acquired an additional nationality.  That implies they are worth less to the organization than they were the day before they acquired the new nationality.  In that case, what business did they have paying them that in the first place?  And definitely the Labour Court would find in favour of an employee who had any part of their remuneration removed because they were Thai.  Even if it were specified in the employment contract and/or in the company rules that certain allowances were only payable to foreign nationals and would be removed immediately in the event the employee became Thai, I am pretty sure that the Labour Court would determine that such provisions were unlawful and unenforceable.  Descriminating against Thais is a very bad idea as far as the Labour Ministry is concerned.

[onthemoon]

43 minutes ago, GabbaGabbaHey said:

Just a general comment but it does make sense to me that once naturalized one would stop being entitled benefits of an expat in Thailand regarding labor legislation aspects, and consequently I don’t see what would force an employer to keep paying any expat advantages.
When I got my PR, not even citizenship, although my company saved 75% of visa-WP renewal costs, they stopped paying the 5,700 baht for the re-entry stamp which I still needs if I travel outside Thailand -but is not mandatory for a PR holder who remains in The country-, you see. so I expect higher level of this when getting naturalization.


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As an employer, I beg to differ. We had a European with Thai  citizenship, and he was paid an expat salary and fringe benefits. The reason for that is that the expectations we had were such that he still had to be an asset to the company and not a cost center. Any born Thai who can achieve the same would be entitled to the same salary and fringe benefits.

 

Nobody will be paid less just because he now has the Thai citizenship. To the contrary, we were quite happy that we did not have to go through the WP procedures.

[GabbaGabbaHey]

13 minutes ago, onthemoon said:

As an employer, I beg to differ. We had a European with Thai  citizenship, and he was paid an expat salary and fringe benefits. The reason for that is that the expectations we had were such that he still had to be an asset to the company and not a cost center. Any born Thai who can achieve the same would be entitled to the same salary and fringe benefits.

 

Nobody will be paid less just because he now has the Thai citizenship. To the contrary, we were quite happy that we did not have to go through the WP procedures.

I understand. I had perhaps more in mind multinational corporations (or international NGOs) that employ expats with special benefits like house rental, driver, plane ticket back to their home country, kids school fees. Once they know a person has been naturalized, they have a way to challenge their package. I'm not saying they will always do that but I feel they'd be tempted to reconsider the terms when the contract expires of prior to that. But I may be wrong. Each case must be different for sure.

[Arkady]

23 minutes ago, GabbaGabbaHey said:

I understand. I had perhaps more in mind multinational corporations (or international NGOs) that employ expats with special benefits like house rental, driver, plane ticket back to their home country, kids school fees. Once they know a person has been naturalized, they have a way to challenge their package. I'm not saying they will always do that but I feel they'd be tempted to reconsider the terms when the contract expires of prior to that. But I may be wrong. Each case must be different for sure.

If you were to retain your existing citizenship, you could argue you were an expat entitled to the same benefits when you renewed your contract, if the organisation was so petty minded as to try to cull your remuneration.  Probably best to only tell people who need to know (i.e. admin staff who have to get your WPs) , if you work for this type of organisation that looks for any opportunity to nickle and dime its senior staff.  Because Thai wages are so low in most sectors, most international organisations in Thailand will only pay more for expats, if they are sure they can't find a born Thai to do the job for much less.

[samran]

2 hours ago, Big Guns said:

Has anyone had benefits removed from their employment contract as a result of Thai citizenship e.g flights & bonus. I have an issue with this at the moment. If anyone can PM me with advice as its a bit of a nightmare scenario.

Depends on the industry I guess. 

 

Born a dual citizen - but...I’ve had the range of experiences from people expecting me to take a low salary (you must be from a rich family so can afford it - untrue) to accepting that if you wanted a set of skills you needed to pay closer to the international market rate.

 

I’ve always have been a lousy negotiator so didn’t ask for any bells and whistles which in hindsight I could have for my last multinational employer... but that was a decade ago. 

 

I work for myself now and my boss is an @rsehole so I get nothing special.

 

My wife on the other hand naturalised a few years back. She was offered a contract mid last year and we were worried that they would employ her as ‘local’. 

 

It turned out they offered her a halfway house. Equivalent international salary, education for the kidlets and health care. Flights and housing allowance after two years of service. From her case, the passport didn’t matter and what she got was the standard package for people hired locally but with international experience. 

 

My advice is survey what the other expats are getting and go for something equivalent. 

Edited February 5, 2018 by samran

[THAIJAMES]

A lot of international organizations have strict payment and benefit rules regarding expats and local citizens.  Basically if you are a person working in a country of your citizenship you are not an expat and are put in the payscale and the benefits scheme of local persons.

 

I guess the lesson would be not to make your dual citizenship known to your employer?

Edited February 6, 2018 by THAIJAMES