Hi everyone,

I plan to take my family (of 3, me included) to live in Bangkok for a year starting in November 2009. Here's the situation :

- My wife and I, would be learning Thai in a language school, applying for a Student Visa. Neither of us would work. We have some income from rented real estate, in the 1500+$/month range.

- My mother who is retired, would I guess be on a retirement Visa. Retirement pension is quite high (2500$+/month)

The three of us are french citizens. Nobody would be working (this is a test year / vacation year, maybe we'd go for something more permanent after if we like it there).

My questions :

- Is there a way to apply for all 3 visas together, or should everyone have a separate file ?

- When should we start the application process to be ready for November 2009 ?

- Any other suggestions for how to make that smooth / efficient ?

Let me know if anymore details are useful. Thanks in advance.

Every one of you would have to apply for it's own visa. You and your wife can come on the grounds of education and your mother could apply on the base of retirement. Retirement requires an income of 65,000 baht a month or 800,000 in a Thai bank account to be able to get an extension of stay for one year. Seems she meets that.

Every one of you would have to apply for it's own visa. You and your wife can come on the grounds of education and your mother could apply on the base of retirement. Retirement requires an income of 65,000 baht a month or 800,000 in a Thai bank account to be able to get an extension of stay for one year. Seems she meets that.

Thanks for the confirmation.

Could anyone tell me what kind of delay I should expect between asking for the visa and getting it ? So as to know when to start the procedure to have everything ready in november.

The visa will be ready in a few days, maybe even the same day you apply.

Once issued, you have 3 months to come to Thailand and make use of the visa. When you enter Thailand you get a permisison to stay for 90 days. The extensions of your permission to stay to 1 year you have to apply for at your immigration office in Thailand. You can do that within the last 30 days of your permission to stay.

If your mother wants to stay based on 800,000 in a Thai bank account she has to have the money in the bank for 2 months before aplying for an extension.

Yes the Visas are more or less instant.

November is a long way off. You should have no problem.

Thanks to both of you for the very reassuring replies.

Hi Rmn,

I saw that you're interested to study Thai and get a student visa.

I represent a Thai School called My Thai Language School and I speak French so if you're interested to visit our school, you're welcome.

You can find our banner in the thai language section of this website or you can write to //edit - email address removed as per forum rules -please use PM// if you need more information.

Best Regards.

MTL Ae

My Thai Language School.

Another question concerning my mother's retirement Visa : does she need to do the retirement visa application before going to Thailand, or should she got to Thailand on a 90 day Visa, then talk to immigration there to get her retirement Visa ? How many days remaining on her 90 would she need ? With a double entry, can she do that on the second 90 days ? Is there any company that could offer visa run services for a person who is aged and borderline handicapped, like she is ? (taking into account the newest law changes on land based visa runs)

MTL Ae, thanks for the proposition. I'll definitely be contacting you since I'm looking at the different options for language schools right now.

Another question concerning my mother's retirement Visa : does she need to do the retirement visa application before going to Thailand, or should she got to Thailand on a 90 day Visa, then talk to immigration there to get her retirement Visa ? How many days remaining on her 90 would she need ? With a double entry, can she do that on the second 90 days ? Is there any company that could offer visa run services for a person who is aged and borderline handicapped, like she is ? (taking into account the newest law changes on land based visa runs)

MTL Ae, thanks for the proposition. I'll definitely be contacting you since I'm looking at the different options for language schools right now.

For extension of stay one year, 21 days before stamp goes out. ( based on retirement )

800.000 thb in Thai bank for three months.

Can also be made with letter from embassy stating 65.000/month.

Or a combination of the two.

Thanks for confirming that.

Will she need to go to a neighbooring country to make the change to Retirement Visa ? As I mentionned, her mobility is a problem (she needs special accomodations for travel).

She will not need to leave the country. As long as she gets a single entry O visa before departing it will be a simple matter of going to immigration within the last 30 days of her stay and getting a 1 year extension. She will need a letter from the embassy confirming her retirement income of at least 65,000 baht per month or 800,000 baht in the bank for 2 months ( old rules was 3 months now 2 for first application).

Edited December 16, 200817 yr by ubonjoe