Story Of My Thai Citizenship Application

[Time Traveller]

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What you had in the past will not work. You have to be currently working to apply.

Well I do have annual tax clearance documents going back many many years and I do have copies of work permits covering more than 25 years. I did hold a work permit at retirement.

Thanks Ubonjoe, maybe I'll work again for a couple of years!

Can you please comment on the age factor.

Thanks.

Age is only one of the categories for the points system that is used to screen applicants. It won't be a big problem since the maximum in that category is 10 points, but for being over 60 you would get 5 points - ie. only losing 5 points.

PR is worth up to 20 points depending up on how long you have held it. Unfortunately without a job you wouldn't qualify under the existing citzenship rules which I think require applicants to have held a work permit continously for the 3 years up until the time of the application (maybe someone has more recent info on this) + 3 years of tax receipts.

Obviously you have your own personal reasons for wanting citzenship, but even if you were to start working again now at 70 you could be almost 80 before you actually gain citzenship due to the backlog of processing. And apparently you need to be working right up until the application has been approved which could be many years. Not to discourage you but is it worth it? It sounds like you've spent most of your life here without citzenship, with no problem.

Edited October 17, 2014 by Time Traveller

[Arkady]

Scorecard's situation has already been accurately summed up by others. His age would not be a barrier because he would pick up the maximum points for years with PR but he would have to go back to work for 3 complete tax years, earning 40k s month, if married to a Thai, and 80k a month, if not.

As Ubonjoe mentioned, you do need to continue working with a WP and earning the minimum salary throughout the process. This is a significant difference from the PR process where it is only your status on application that counts and you can retire before reaching the finishing line.

before the interview with the MOI citizenship applicants may be asked to show their WPs proving they have been in employment from 3 years before application until the present date, even though Special Branch might not have scrutinised and submitted this information fully on accepting their applications. You can also be asked to provide an updated letter confirming your employment at any time in the process. I was asked for one 2.5 years after application. Finally, once the King has signed, you need to submit up-to-date copies of your docs, including current WP, and get finger printed again for verification when you make the oath of allegiance.

[Oasis]

Not my wording. That was from The Nation's English summary of DOPA's Thai press release.

What Anuphong was saying was that he agrees with proper screening of nationality in accordance with existing law and regulations but that taking 5-7 years to do this is unacceptable and impinges on the human rights of applicants. He has just approved 641 applicants one month into the job, vs historic rates averaging 160 a year. Give the guy a break.

Yes, publishing full names and addresses could be regarded as an invasion of privacy but that will all be published in the RG too, as anyone who applies for citizenship ought to be aware. I don't think any of them are complaining about that right now. The important aspect of publishing the names in advance, which has never been done before, is that Anuphong wants to protect them from being exploited by officials and others who might otherwise claim they can get them on the list and demand money for what they have already got. Again, please give him a break.

MOI minister is doing a great job, please keep it up, Khun Anuphong Paochinda

[wonder6281]

So if you aren't or have never worked but are married to a Thai National with dependants; are you precluded for applying for PR? Reading elsewhere you need to prove you have paid tax as well for a period of time. How does one do that if they have never worked?

[Mario2008]

You do not meet the requirements for acquiring Thai nationality, you could apply for PR if your wife meets the income requirement of at least 30,000 a month. (In reality it will be difficult, as they expect you to support your wife and not the otherway around).

[Arkady]

So if you aren't or have never worked but are married to a Thai National with dependants; are you precluded for applying for PR? Reading elsewhere you need to prove you have paid tax as well for a period of time. How does one do that if they have never worked?

It only works the other round. If you are a foreign woman with a Thai husband, you can apply for Thai nationality under Section 9 without ever having worked in Thailand. The husband then has to show income of B15k a month. As mentioned earlier in this thread, the original draft of the 2008 amendments would have allowed Section 9 to apply equally to foreign husbands of Thai women but the MOI's legal committee decided that was too much of a threat to national security and scrubbed that idea from the bill.

As Mario says, the wording of the rules for applying for PR under the humanity category appears to allow you to apply for PR, if your wife is earning B30k a month, but then they still want to see your WP and notarised tax receipts. So it is probably a non-starter and no one has ever reported getting PR on this basis to my knowledge, although one guy reported in Camerata's thread that he went to Immigration with a lawyer and forced them to accept his application (and his B50k fee) without a WP or tax receipts in his own name. I am pretty sure it would have ended up in the circular file and it's up to the minister's discretion by law, so they don't have to give a good reason to reject and might just never get back to you. The numanitarian category actually just seems to mean that you need the same qualifications as those applying under the business quota with no Thai family but you get a 50% discount on the final fee, if you have a Thai wife, for which they they force you to get DNA tests for your children and subject you to the indignity of having to provide photographs of yourself bouncing up and down on the marital bed with your Thai wife. I suppose the discount is worth it though, as the final fee is around B190k.

[JThai]

having to provide photographs of yourself bouncing up and down on the marital bed with your Thai wife. I suppose the discount is worth it though, as the final fee is around B190k.

Is this serious? What the hell is that?

[wonder6281]

I think I will pass going down this track then. Just have to do the Annual extension until I expire, which at 52, hopefully will be a very long time.

[Arkady]

having to provide photographs of yourself bouncing up and down on the marital bed with your Thai wife. I suppose the discount is worth it though, as the final fee is around B190k.

Is this serious? What the hell is that?

For some years applicants for PR with a Thai wife have been asked to provide a picture of themselves on the marital bed with their Thai wife. Immigration staff have alse been known to come to the marital home with or without an appointment and ask questions of household servants about whether you really sleep in the same room or not. One of my friends told the story of them arriving unannounced and trying to grill their Burmese maid on these matters. The only problem was that the maid could speak English but hardly a word of Thai. If you have Thai children, you will be asked for DNA evidence of paternity, even though having Thai children doesn't qualify you for a discount, if you no longer have the Thai wife, and, in reality, make no difference to your application at all.

Citizenship applications, because they are processed by Special Branch, not Immigration, are mercifully free of the more superfluous requirements imposed on PR applicants by Immigration.

[Arkady]

I think I will pass going down this track then. Just have to do the Annual extension until I expire, which at 52, hopefully will be a very long time.

Sorry to learn that you will expire at 52. Enjoy it while you can.

[wonder6281]

I think I will pass going down this track then. Just have to do the Annual extension until I expire, which at 52, hopefully will be a very long time.

Sorry to learn that you will expire at 52. Enjoy it while you can.

[Jean Pierre Jacquot]

Sounds the Thai citizenship application process has much improved. Everything pretty logic just one point I do not understand: the WP issue. So what about early retirees? They cannot get thai citizenship though they might have lived in Thailand for many many years?

I always wanted to get Thai citizenship but in the old days it seemed to be too difficult without the proper connection. Used to work in development organizations for many years in Thailand. Speak, read and write Thai very well. Married, children, enough savings. Know how to behave with Thai people, excellent education. Somehow certainly a good candidate. But: early retired.

So for a guy like me it is a no-no?

[Mario2008]

A retiree wil not get Thai nationality or PR.

(PR is technically possible if the wife earns enough (more than 30,000 a month).

[NewlyMintedThai]

Sounds the Thai citizenship application process has much improved. Everything pretty logic just one point I do not understand: the WP issue. So what about early retirees? They cannot get thai citizenship though they might have lived in Thailand for many many years?

I always wanted to get Thai citizenship but in the old days it seemed to be too difficult without the proper connection. Used to work in development organizations for many years in Thailand. Speak, read and write Thai very well. Married, children, enough savings. Know how to behave with Thai people, excellent education. Somehow certainly a good candidate. But: early retired.

So for a guy like me it is a no-no?

Too bad you listened to those people who said it was difficult or impossible in the past.

If you had gone through the steps back then, you would have had it by then.

I started the process in 1999 when I first applied for PR. 10 years later, I was a citizen.

It is the best thing ever.

[GarryP]

Sounds the Thai citizenship application process has much improved. Everything pretty logic just one point I do not understand: the WP issue. So what about early retirees? They cannot get thai citizenship though they might have lived in Thailand for many many years?

I always wanted to get Thai citizenship but in the old days it seemed to be too difficult without the proper connection. Used to work in development organizations for many years in Thailand. Speak, read and write Thai very well. Married, children, enough savings. Know how to behave with Thai people, excellent education. Somehow certainly a good candidate. But: early retired.

So for a guy like me it is a no-no?

Too bad you listened to those people who said it was difficult or impossible in the past.

If you had gone through the steps back then, you would have had it by then.

I started the process in 1999 when I first applied for PR. 10 years later, I was a citizen.

It is the best thing ever.

I am sure it was well worth it but doesn't 10 years seem inordinately long to process a citizenship application. There really does not seem to be any reason for that length of time. Hopefully under General Anupong things won't be so slow.

[NewlyMintedThai]

It was three years to process the citizenship application.

I applied for PR in 1999.

Two years to get that, in 2001.

Applied for citizenship after 5 years as PR and had it three years later.

[GarryP]

It was three years to process the citizenship application.

I applied for PR in 1999.

Two years to get that, in 2001.

Applied for citizenship after 5 years as PR and had it three years later.

Got you. So in fact the citizenship application only took three years, which is quite fast by current standards. Some people have been waiting much longer than that just to be called to the interview at the Ministry of the Interior.

[NewlyMintedThai]

Sure. Political instability inevitably leads to longer wait times.

Patience still pays off big in the end, though. The feeling of owning land and businesses in your own name, paying local prices at national parks, boxing stadiums, and tourist attractions without argument, having zero wait time going through the automatic turnstiles at Swampy, traveling visa and hassle-free to surrounding countries, and being able to vote all make it worthwhile.

[nontabury]

Sounds the Thai citizenship application process has much improved. Everything pretty logic just one point I do not understand: the WP issue. So what about early retirees? They cannot get thai citizenship though they might have lived in Thailand for many many years?

I always wanted to get Thai citizenship but in the old days it seemed to be too difficult without the proper connection. Used to work in development organizations for many years in Thailand. Speak, read and write Thai very well. Married, children, enough savings. Know how to behave with Thai people, excellent education. Somehow certainly a good candidate. But: early retired.

So for a guy like me it is a no-no?

Too bad you listened to those people who said it was difficult or impossible in the past.

If you had gone through the steps back then, you would have had it by then.

I started the process in 1999 when I first applied for PR. 10 years later, I was a citizen.

It is the best thing ever.

It is the best thing ever. Please explain.

[NewlyMintedThai]

I just did, above.

[GarryP]

Too bad you listened to those people who said it was difficult or impossible in the past.

If you had gone through the steps back then, you would have had it by then.

I started the process in 1999 when I first applied for PR. 10 years later, I was a citizen.

It is the best thing ever.

It is the best thing ever. Please explain.

Sure. Political instability inevitably leads to longer wait times.

Patience still pays off big in the end, though. The feeling of owning land and businesses in your own name, paying local prices at national parks, boxing stadiums, and tourist attractions without argument, having zero wait time going through the automatic turnstiles at Swampy, traveling visa and hassle-free to surrounding countries, and being able to vote all make it worthwhile.

Nontabury please see the response above.

Personally, I do not travel very much and keep away from tourist attractions, so a lot of what you find good, has no real bearing on the matter for me. But to own property in your own name, or own your own business, do whatever you want in terms of work, be it a food vendor or a rocket scientist you can do it without any worries at all (provided you have the required skills), to not have to worry about changing immigration rules, etc. certainly make me believe it is worthwhile if you intend to spend most or all of the rest of your life here.

[NewlyMintedThai]

Yes...I forgot about being completely free from the work permit merry-go-round. And never having to visit Chaengwattana's freak show ever again.

[nontabury]

I just did, above.

Sorry our posts must have crossed.

If you think those are the best things ever, you must have a very sheltered life.

Personally I can think of only one advantage to be gained with a Thai passport,the right to hold land in my own name,all the other advantages,as you describe them, are quite easily to get around or just ignore.

[NewlyMintedThai]

So, let me get this straight.

You clicked on a topic in which you have no interest in order to proclaim to the world your lack of interest and insult those who do happen to be interested?

Talk about having too much time on one's hands.

Edited November 19, 2014 by NewlyMintedThai

[Arkady]

Sounds the Thai citizenship application process has much improved. Everything pretty logic just one point I do not understand: the WP issue. So what about early retirees? They cannot get thai citizenship though they might have lived in Thailand for many many years?

I always wanted to get Thai citizenship but in the old days it seemed to be too difficult without the proper connection. Used to work in development organizations for many years in Thailand. Speak, read and write Thai very well. Married, children, enough savings. Know how to behave with Thai people, excellent education. Somehow certainly a good candidate. But: early retired.

So for a guy like me it is a no-no?

Too bad you listened to those people who said it was difficult or impossible in the past.

If you had gone through the steps back then, you would have had it by then.

I started the process in 1999 when I first applied for PR. 10 years later, I was a citizen.

It is the best thing ever.

The process for PR has got much more difficult (and more expensive) with much more onerous documentation, a language test and can now take 5 years or more, whereas it took a maximum of 12 months when I applied in 1995. The citizenship process has not changed a lot, although the law changed in 2008 to allow men married to Thais to bypass PR. However, like PR the timeline has become massively extended. Whereas it used to take 2-3 years, it is now taking around 3 years for applicants to be interviewed at the MoI and some have still heard nothing at all after 4 or more years. After interview it has been taking up to 3 years or more for the minister to sign. The rest of the process takes at best a year but more, if there are political disruptions. So we are probably looking at a 5-10 year process for most. Gen Anuphong seems to have taken some steps to improve things but the process will probably slip back to what it was, as soon as he is gone.

I foolishly procrastinated for a long time after getting PR and am now hopefully near the end of the line after nearly 5 years. The moral of the story is most things to do with foreigners just get worse, if you wait. The idea of needing great connections is a bit of a myth. It is true that really good connections, who are prepared to make the effort to go in to bat for you can speed things up a lot but most people who get citizenship only have average connections who make no difference.

[Jean Pierre Jacquot]

Unfortunately, without annual income tax statements and a valid work permit you are precluded.

What about if you have a monthly income of let's say 50 K which is interest from fixed term accounts in Thailand? And of course go to declare it at the Tax office, so pay taxes on that income. Would that be fine? I know still the work permit but some people have work permits but earn less than 40 K per month.

[nontabury]

So, let me get this straight.

You clicked on a topic in which you have no interest in order to proclaim to the world your lack of interest and insult those who do happen to be interested?

Talk about having too much time on one's hands.

"No" just curiouser as to why people think that a Thai passport is so important.

[tamvine]

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So, let me get this straight.

You clicked on a topic in which you have no interest in order to proclaim to the world your lack of interest and insult those who do happen to be interested?

Talk about having too much time on one's hands.

"No" just curiouser as to why people think that a Thai passport is so important.

Well, I got PR after waiting for 6 years and have applied for Thai Nationality and few years have already passed. I want Thai Nationality since that falls in line with my Objectives (certainly never thought of owning land).

This Thread has been very helpful to me as PR Thread had been. People who intend to get Thai Citizenship value this thread and anyone is Welcome and make use of it. Members who started such threads and others who contributed have done a Great favour to others.

We respect your curiosity in the theme and hope everything is clear now to you and Thanks for your interest.

[GarryP]

Unfortunately, without annual income tax statements and a valid work permit you are precluded.

What about if you have a monthly income of let's say 50 K which is interest from fixed term accounts in Thailand? And of course go to declare it at the Tax office, so pay taxes on that income. Would that be fine? I know still the work permit but some people have work permits but earn less than 40 K per month.

Unfortunately, you need to be working so the work permit is essential.

[Time Traveller]

Sure. Political instability inevitably leads to longer wait times.

Patience still pays off big in the end, though. The feeling of owning land and businesses in your own name, paying local prices at national parks, boxing stadiums, and tourist attractions without argument, having zero wait time going through the automatic turnstiles at Swampy, traveling visa and hassle-free to surrounding countries, and being able to vote all make it worthwhile.

Owning land -- if that's what you want, sure

Owning business in your name -- Non thais already legally can do this as long as it's not on the restricted list

Local prices at national parks/boxing stadiums/tourist attractions -- not many of which I would even bother visiting even if they were free. Thai national parks are laughable.

Zero waiting time at airports -- ok if you're a frequent traveller and your life is so busy you can't stand in line for 20 or 30 minutes which I think they still do that anyway when you have to remove your shoes at the security.

Travelling Visa and hassle free to surrounding countries -- This is not just Thai passport holders most developed world passport holders already have that priviledge or at least VOA options

Being able to vote -- What country are you talking about? Thailand? Seriously, you mention that? Your vote is meaningless, popular elections get overthrown and there currently is no voting or even a timeframe when anyone will even be allowed to vote again..

Most of these a meaningless points. In fact, it probably highlights more the problems the average thai faces in daily life then it does any significant advantage the newlyminted Thai has over Non-Thais.

In fact the only thing citizenship does give is the right to live in Thailand without visas. That's the only point that is relevent.

Edited November 21, 2014 by Time Traveller