Immigration jail, What's it like?

[Daffy D]

With the recent crackdown on overstayers the local immigration detention centers must be getting pretty full. 

Just wondering what they are like.

 

I'm guessing you aren't thrown in a cage with 100 or more others with hardly enough room to sleep on the floor and a stinking hole in the corner as a toilet.

 

So what are the conditions, anyone have actual first hand experience?

 

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

Guess you are allowed a phone, are there charging points, how about a laptop, allowed?
 WiFi ? 

Can you buy things like soap and toothpaste? and snacks?

 

Visitors allowed?

 

Visit from your Country's Embassy?

 

Just a few things that come to mind. Feel free to add to the list.
 

[Hummin]

1 minute ago, Daffy D said:

With the recent crackdown on overstayers the local immigration detention centers must be getting pretty full. 

Just wondering what they are like.

 

I'm guessing you aren't thrown in a cage with 100 or more others with hardly enough room to sleep on the floor and a stinking hole in the corner as a toilet.

 

So what are the conditions, anyone have actual first hand experience?

 

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

Guess you are allowed a phone, are there charging points, how about a laptop, allowed?
 WiFi ? 

Can you buy things like soap and toothpaste? and snacks?

 

Visitors allowed?

 

Visit from your Country's Embassy?

 

Just a few things that come to mind. Feel free to add to the list.
 

From what I have heard first hand from Koh Samui, a dirty stinking hole, and valium was available. Others have said same about Bangkok. 

 

"We were rats in a cage they roamed in, but some guards allowed themselves to be bribed, and bought valium from fellow prisoners to get some sleep. We can talk later. Exhausted…

 

Good luck

[Daffy D]

2 minutes ago, Hummin said:

From what I have heard first hand from Koh Samui, a dirty stinking hole, and valium was available. Others have said same about Bangkok. 

 

"We were rats in a cage they roamed in, but some guards allowed themselves to be bribed, and bought valium from fellow prisoners to get some sleep. We can talk later. Exhausted…

 

Good luck

Don't like the sound of that  

[roo860]

14 minutes ago, Daffy D said:

With the recent crackdown on overstayers the local immigration detention centers must be getting pretty full. 

Just wondering what they are like.

 

I'm guessing you aren't thrown in a cage with 100 or more others with hardly enough room to sleep on the floor and a stinking hole in the corner as a toilet.

 

So what are the conditions, anyone have actual first hand experience?

 

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

Guess you are allowed a phone, are there charging points, how about a laptop, allowed?
 WiFi ? 

Can you buy things like soap and toothpaste? and snacks?

 

Visitors allowed?

 

Visit from your Country's Embassy?

 

Just a few things that come to mind. Feel free to add to the list.
 

You missed out sauna and jacuzzi. 

[marin]

One picture of Bangkok Immigration Remand should answer all your questions..

 

 

[darrendsd]

Op you're living in a dream world if you think all those things are available, it's not a hotel with all mod cons 

 

https://www.ucanews.com/news/caged-like-animals-inside-bangkoks-notorious-idc/87104

 

I know someone who spent a week in the IDC Bangkok, he said it was hell

[bignok]

1 minute ago, marin said:

One picture of Bangkok Immigration Remand should answer all your questions..

 

 

Not many middle class farangs there

[GroveHillWanderer]

31 minutes ago, Daffy D said:

With the recent crackdown on overstayers the local immigration detention centers must be getting pretty full. 

Just wondering what they are like.

 

I'm guessing you aren't thrown in a cage with 100 or more others with hardly enough room to sleep on the floor and a stinking hole in the corner as a toilet.

 

So what are the conditions, anyone have actual first hand experience?

 

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

Guess you are allowed a phone, are there charging points, how about a laptop, allowed?
 WiFi ? 

Can you buy things like soap and toothpaste? and snacks?

 

Visitors allowed?

 

Visit from your Country's Embassy?

 

Just a few things that come to mind. Feel free to add to the list.
 

There have been a couple of relatively recent posts from people held in IDC. By all accounts the conditions are every bit as bad as the regular prisons here, if not worse in some ways (sometimes more overcrowded apparently, for instance).

[Neeranam]

31 minutes ago, Daffy D said:

I'm guessing you aren't thrown in a cage with 100 or more others with hardly enough room to sleep on the floor and a stinking hole in the corner as a toilet.

wrong

[Neeranam]

30 minutes ago, Hummin said:

and bought valium from fellow prisoners to get some sleep.

don't know if I'd want to sleep with prisoners so close to me

[Woof999]

I've heard that the movie selection is mostly Thai, and way out of date compared to the cinema. They only started showing Top Gun Maverick this month and it was in Thai subtitles with the English soundtrack dubbed out.

 

Apparently the curtains don't fully block out the early morning sun, so that would be a good time to get up and look out over the lawns.

 

As for meals, there are usually only 2 choices, meat or fish. Soy sauce available but no ketchup.

 

The charging points are only low power. Takes almost a day for most of the inmates to fully charge their phones.

 

Laundry service is not what it used to be though. Shame..

[Liverpool Lou]

38 minutes ago, GroveHillWanderer said:

By all accounts the conditions are every bit as bad as the regular prisons here,

Regular prisons (such as Klong Prem) are nowhere near as bad as the pictures suggest IDC is.

[oxo1947]

Suan Phlu is the worse prison in Thailand-- and part of the problem is that foreign prisoners that have finished their sentence  are sent there waiting for their embassy to OK a flight to return home. Some Embassy's (UK stands Out) seem to take an age shuffling papers around even after relations back home have forwarded their C Card to pay for it. 

My Last visit was in 2018-Women Children and men were thrown together in one area-- the stench was overwhelming,  & woe be it if you happen to be there when there is an immigration raid-- the numbers can double overnight. Sexual assaults on women & children were on a daily occurrence. After pressure from western countries--In 2020 Thailand said it would not Jail children or women--together with the men.

[Felton Jarvis]

Imagine HELL,…. then multiply it by ten.

[novacova]

1 hour ago, Daffy D said:

So what are the conditions, anyone have actual first hand experience?

 

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

Guess you are allowed a phone, are there charging points, how about a laptop, allowed?
 WiFi ? 

Can you buy things like soap and toothpaste? and snacks?

 

Visitors allowed?

 

Visit from your Country's Embassy?

Do you plan on staying there?

[proton]

3 hours ago, marin said:

One picture of Bangkok Immigration Remand should answer all your questions..

 

 

This is what they should do with illegal arrivals and over stayers in the UK- make it a deterrent, not a 3 star hotel.

[watchcat]

13 hours ago, marin said:

One picture of Bangkok Immigration Remand should answer all your questions..

 

 

Looks awful but it's easy to avoid; Do not overstay your Visa.

[Daffy D]

Than you all for your contribution to this thread.

 

Some serious useful information and some of the usual attempts at humor. Finding yourself in a potential overstay situation can happen to practically anyone, no matter how secure you may think you are today.

 

Nobody plans to get caught on overstay and no it's not always  "easy to avoid".

 

No matter how good and secure your situation, one day the Gods will remember you and put a stop to all that complacency. 

 

 

 (Loosely quoted from "Out of Africa")

[Woof999]

34 minutes ago, Daffy D said:

Nobody plans to get caught on overstay and no it's not always  "easy to avoid".

It's not difficult to avoid an overstay that is likely to get your held in the IDC. Even if you were incapacitated in hospital and unable to do anything about your visa requirements for a significant period of time, that scenario is unlikely to result in your visiting the IDC.

 

What point are your actually trying to make? Prepare for something that will not happen unless you are a muppet? Worry about something just for the sake of worrying?

[mokwit]

Abut 20 years ago I did my 90 day report at Suan Phluu a day late. They sent me to the IDC to pay a Bt2,000 fine. The IO at the next desk was fiddling with a set of leg irons [two U's on a rod type] that seemed to need fixing.

 

I was a Professional on a priority visa and was a day late because I was working so hard promoting investing in Thailand, i forgot. I imagine many expat professionals subjected to that would have called their wife and told her to get the kids out of school and meet at the airport, we're leaving.

 

I have to go back home for end of life care as one of the risks is being too sick to do my extension and going onto overstay and Imm coming to get me - I may end up in IDC when I should be in hospital.

[mokwit]

11 minutes ago, Woof999 said:

Even if you were incapacitated in hospital and unable to do anything about your visa requirements for a significant period of time, that scenario is unlikely to result in your visiting the IDC.

What if you are at home and too sick but not obviously incapacitated and don't have all the Doctors paperwork they require?. Don't be too sure you won't end up in IDC If the Imm. Doctor doesn't think you are a hospital case. They recently arrested a 76 year old man for being on overstay. Is he being held in a 3 star hotel while his deportation goes through?

 

Once you break the law you are no longer a welcome G7 high value tourist but a criminal in their judicial system.

[mokwit]

Remember, IMM requirements are very specific and they are very pedantic.

 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjmvK_eoLOAAxWwyTgGHbstCmkQFnoECBMQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww2.si.mahidol.ac.th%2Fen%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2019%2F09%2F2019-VISA-EXTENSION-FOR-MEDICAL-CASE-revised.pdf&usg=AOvVaw02wuEFxViou0koQqcVKhup&opi=89978449

 

Try sorting that out from your sick bed.

 

Someone I knew went onto overstay at a "top" [read "expensive"] private hospital. they offered the service of doing medical visas for patients but somehow messed his up.

[Daffy D]

24 minutes ago, mokwit said:

They recently arrested a 76 year old man for being on overstay. Is he being held in a 3 star hotel while his deportation goes through?

That sounds more promising   

 

Though I don't have the funds nor do I want to be deported. 

 

 

 

Opps! Just realized the "is he? "

Wistful thinking perhaps 

[BarraMarra]

18 hours ago, Woof999 said:

I've heard that the movie selection is mostly Thai, and way out of date compared to the cinema. They only started showing Top Gun Maverick this month and it was in Thai subtitles with the English soundtrack dubbed out.

 

Apparently the curtains don't fully block out the early morning sun, so that would be a good time to get up and look out over the lawns.

 

As for meals, there are usually only 2 choices, meat or fish. Soy sauce available but no ketchup.

 

The charging points are only low power. Takes almost a day for most of the inmates to fully charge their phones.

 

Laundry service is not what it used to be though. Shame..

Luxury in the UK your not allowed a phone.

[Woof999]

24 minutes ago, mokwit said:

What if you are at home and too sick but not obviously incapacitated and don't have all the Doctors paperwork they require?. Don't be too sure you won't end up in IDC If the Imm. Doctor doesn't think you are a hospital case.

Do you have any real experience of this ever happening and leading to someone too sick to fulfill the requirements of getting a visa extension but still being held in the IDC?

 

24 minutes ago, mokwit said:

They recently arrested a 76 year old man for being on overstay. Is he being held in a 3 star hotel while his deportation goes through?

Age alone isn't a reason for not being held in IDC. Was this 76yo man incapacitated to the point of not being able to do what he should have done?

 

24 minutes ago, mokwit said:

Once you break the law you are no longer a welcome G7 high value tourist but a criminal in their judicial system.

I can't think of too many countries where that isn't the same.

[mokwit]

19 hours ago, Daffy D said:

What do they supply? bed, blanket, towel.  Meals, drinking water, Laundry service, change of clothes?

5 litre water container, but access to the one water spigot is apparently controlled by Iranian gangsters.

[bob smith]

Oh its lovely yeah.

 

nice pool and michelin star restaurant attached.

 

would highly reccomend to anyone.

[mokwit]

6 minutes ago, bob smith said:

Oh its lovely yeah.

 

nice pool and michelin star restaurant attached.

 

would highly reccomend to anyone.

I think Swedish criminals would probably be disappointed by the standards of the facility.

[ChaiyaTH]

So they always force you to fly to your home country as well right, is that a fact or just gossip too? 
 

I knew a friend of a friend who was fked near a decade ago and ended up there for a day, costed him 110k baht for a business flight to europe unless he wanted to stay another 3 days. He paid it of course.

 

While logically thinking I would get the first flight to anywhere, Malaysia etc, if being deported.

 

He came back 2 weeks later and got the elite visa as it was before the changes in law.

[Ohyesuare]

7 minutes ago, ChaiyaTH said:

So they always force you to fly to your home country as well right, is that a fact or just gossip too? 
 

I knew a friend of a friend who was fked near a decade ago and ended up there for a day, costed him 110k baht for a business flight to europe unless he wanted to stay another 3 days. He paid it of course.

 

While logically thinking I would get the first flight to anywhere, Malaysia etc, if being deported.

 

He came back 2 weeks later and got the elite visa as it was before the changes in law.

Pretty sure when being refused entry upon arrival by air, you need to return back to your point of origin at the airline's cost if it was due to something they missed/didn't check for (like a proper visa). When being deported for other reasons, you must return to the country of the passport you entered with. You don't get to pick and choose where to go.