Single-entry O Visa In Penang (thai Child Support)

[simon43]

Perhaps mods could add this post to the 'latest reports' sticky.

On Sunday, I flew to Penang to obtain a single entry, non-immigrant O visa based on support of my 3 year old Thai son. (I am divorced from the Thai mother, and my name is on the birth certificate, and my son carries my surname).

The Sunday AirAsia flight from Bangkok should have left at 2pm, but finally left at 5pm after some mechanical delays. The return air ticket costed me only 3,000 baht, so clearly a guarantee that the plane would leave on time was not included in the cost.

On arrival in Penang, I took a 38 RM taxi into Chulia Street and met with the agent who was handling my visa application. (There are many agents like this in Chulia Street, and they charge about 200 baht. It is not neccessary to go to the Thai consulate. Because of the time to process your visa application, you need to hand your application to the agent on the first morning and then collect your passport the next day at about 2.30pm. This still leaves time to catch the Air Asia flight back to Bangkok at about 5pm).

I showed the following documents:

- Original divorce certificate

- Original birth certificate of my son

- Thai Bank book and certification from the British embassy that I received at least 40,000 baht income per month.

- copy of my Thai ex ID card.

and paid a total of 240RM for the visa and agent fee.

I was intending to do some work using my laptop whilst waiting for my visa. However, almost all the hotels did not have any wifi, paid or free! I asked at many hotels in the area, but my request for wifi was typically met with a 'this is a hotel, go to an internet shop if you want to use your computer'.

I finally stayed the Sunday night at the Hotel Malaysia, just around the corner from Chulia Street. This overpriced (80 RM) hotel offered a well-worn room with no fridge or minibar, no user-adjustable air-con, but wifi! Unfortunately, the wifi connection was problematic and very slow. So the next day I moved to the new Tune Hotel (a 10 RM taxi ride away, and part of the AirAsia group of companies). That hotel offered small but clean rooms, with a hot power shower and other services that are selected from a customer menu - just like on Air Asia planes. I opted for the aircon, towel/shower set and wifi! The total cost was about 90RM. (Hint - the air-con was not really needed since there is a strong and free fan in the room as standard). The wifi worked great and I recommend staying at Tune Hotel for this reason alone. There was a 7/11 and Starbucks + other shops immediately outside.

Comment - Don't forget that Penang uses the British 3-square pin power plugs. You can buy a plug adapter in 'Young Ones' shop, about 200 meters from Tune Hotel.

ATM machines are not that common in Penang! But there was an ATM in the Hong Leong Bank, some 400 meters from the hotel.

I can sum up Penang as dull, dull, dull! The nightlife was almost non-existent. The Soho free house, at the top end of Chulia street, offered expensive beer in an almost pitch-black room with deafening music. I finally located a good pub/bistro about 300 meters further away, about 200 meters up from the Maybank building. This pub offered a free buffet and reasonably pretty bar-staff . Whilst walking back to my hotel, I was offered the services of a large Russian lady and 2 of the ugliest Thai ladyboys that I have ever seen, (I took a photo...).

Anyway, back to the visa:

On Tuesday at 2.30pm, I returned to the visa agent who duly handed back my passport with new visa. It was a B visa!!

Quite why the Thai consulate had issued me with a B visa when I showed no company or business papers etc was beyond me. Although a B visa would enable me to stay in Thailand for the next 3 months, I was concerned that I could have problems when I applied for a 1-year extension in-country, (again based on support of my Thai son). I pointed out the error to the agent and he jumped on his motorbike, returning 15 minutes later with 'B' crossed out and 'O' written on the visa, signed and stamped.

On my return to Bangkok, (plane delayed 1 hour ), I had no problems at Immgration and was duly given a 90 day stamp.

In a week or so, I will travel to Phuket Immigration to extend my new O visa, and finally (fingers crossed), be able to remain in Thailand each year without having to juggle visas...

To summarise:

- Penang seems a good place to get a new visa, (O or B - it didn't seem to matter so much because clearly no-one really bothered looking at the papers that I submitted with my visa application!)

- If you are prone to dying of boredom, Penang could be high risk

- If you have high blood pressure that is exacerpated by flight delays, Penang could be high risk

- If you expect clean, new hotels, with smiling staff and effcient service, you could be disappointed - unless you stay at Tune Hotel. (I own a hotel in Thailand, so perhaps I am too picky about bad service in hotels...)

- If you require reliable wifi access, stay at Tune hotel

Since my employer was paying for this visa run, I kept a note of the costs involved. Overall, including flight, visa fee, hotel, taxi and food, the total cost was about 10,000 baht. That's not exactly cheap, and is really due to the need to stay in town overnight, (2 nights in my case, due to the time of the AirAsia flights).

Simon

[Mario2008]

Thanks for your report Simon, I'm sure other will find it useful and we hope to hear from you about getting an extension based on support of a Thai child. We haven't have many reports about that yet, as this is a new/changed possibility. But I'm sure everything will work out well.