Hi, I hope some of the experts here can provide some advice,

We were told by a labour department officer that the relaxed work permit requirement of 1 million baht capital for a foreigner married to a Thai national would only apply to a company's first work permit and that the WP holder must be both a shareholder and director of the company.

When the company applies for a second work permit for a married (or unmarried) foreigner, the requirements for both work permit holders revert to the normal case of 2m baht paid up capital per work permit. So 1m baht capital for 1 work permit but 4m baht capital for 2 work permits.

In our case, we have a 3m baht capital company with 100+ Thai staff and currently one work permit for the company director/shareholder who is married to a Thai.

To get a second work permit, we were told we would need to increase the capital to 4m baht regardless of whether the foreigner is married to a Thai or is a director or shareholder.

In our case the foreigner is married to a Thai but will not be a director or shareholder. We are not a BOI company and the application was in a province far from Bangkok.

I could not find anything on the internet that confirms or refutes this, so any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

Find a lawyers .... if he cant fix it , find another lawyers !

Have a look at this topic from 2004. Department of Employment Regulations 2004

It is made up of posts made by Sunbelt as they translated the new regulations.

It mentions the reduction of the number of employees and registered capital required by one half if the employee is married to a Thai with no mention of the need for them to be an owner or shareholder of company.

The regulation may of changed but I have not found anything saying they have or a translation to English of the latest regulations.

Ubonjoe, thank you for posting the link.

This translation of the regulations and everything else we have read and been told is consistent with 1m baht capital for a married foreigner work permit. My wife and I have found nothing in English or Thai to back up what the labour department officer said about directorship and shareholdings or the reversion to 2m baht capital per married foreigner for the 2nd and subsequent WPs.

But arguing with the officer is futile, so we will start the capital increase process.