Change Of Visa Status

Change of status

Last week I changed my status from being here on a Non-immigrant B to Police Order 606/2006 7:17 to take care of a Thai child or in my case children now that I am over 50.

I had all the paperwork as required, T:7 form filled, original plus copy of the following passport, house registration, birth certificate, wife’s ID, marriage certificate and wife’s birth certificate, school contract for the kids. I also had a family photo taken recently.

When my number was called in room 101 on desk ## the immigration officer asked for bank books and proof of income and gave me another form to fill in for status based on marriage. I explained to the officer and she was adamant this law did not exist but in all fairness asked her superior who then took over from her and agreed that the application was in order and would be considered.

She then explained to the immigration officer on desk ## to accept our application for consideration.

By this time 3 hours had passed and our 4 year old and 6 months old were becoming bored and naughty. The 4 year old overturned the carousel holding the stamps on the immigration officer’s desk and the youngest became irritable and was crying a lot due to boredom.

Despite this the immigration officer proceeded slowly with our application but insisted of having additional photographs showing outside of the house and in particular the address. This was a big surprise to me and caused my wife and I to cringe thinking we needed to return another day.

Likely for me I had my camera in the car with a shot of the eldest kid on a Yamaha Fino taken outside the house. I found a photo service place across the road with a card reader and got the photo printed as it was and enlarged a section of it to show the address.

The address photo was a bit blurred but was accepted by the immigration officer. We were told to wait as the paperwork had to be approved by the chief immigration officer on the second floor.

The senior immigration officer that helped us earlier approached us and told us to go out for lunch. She said normally the will issue me with a 1 month extension while the application is considered but she said as we had been here a long time with the kids she would arrange and interview with her boss after lunch.

We enjoyed the tom yam noodle on soi 3 along with about 30 immigration officers and police and pondered over our application.

To my surprise we as a family were summoned upstairs almost as soon as we got back into immigration to see the chief immigration officer who interviewed my wife in Thai and made several jokes about me. He then asked me several questions on my ability to support the family and my reason to stay in Thailand. He asked if I was rich and asked if I liked golf. I answered him in Thai and explained that I was reasonably comfortable financially enjoy the golf but had a nasty habit of loosing my golf balls in the water.

He laughed and said today I give the visa for one year so good luck, which really did make me feel happy and respect the Thai system which we all sometimes mock.

To all those who intend to apply please ensure that you have a family photo plus long shot and a close-up of the house your wife and children are registered in.