Phuket airport tackles Chinese tourists' immigration queue congestion

[webfact]

Phuket airport tackles Chinese tourists' immigration queue congestion
Phuket Gazette

PHUKET: -- Officials attempted to tackle the issue of immigration congestion at Phuket International Airport caused by the island’s largest inbound tourist market, the Chinese.

Chinese tourists who arrive on charter flights are often not given the TM6 arrival and departure card required by immigration. As a result, they are forced to queue up for the card in the immigration arrival hall, said Zhi Yi Li of Hainan Airlines at a meeting at the airport on October 29.

“In addition, immigration doesn’t set out many cards, so the tourists have to ask for them, which causes further delays,” he said.

Another factor contributing to the immigration bog-down is that there are no TM6 cards written in Chinese.

Deputy Superintendent of Phuket Airport Immigration Rapeepat Utsaha asked for assistance from Chinese tour operators and airlines.

“Please supply the passengers with these cards when they are still on the plane, and show them how to fill them out,” Mr Rapeepat said.

“Thai immigration officers don’t speak [any] Chinese [language] well, so we really need your help with this,” he told the Chinese tour operators at the meeting.

He noted that airport immigration had made a video explaining how to fill out the card, and encouraged the airlines to show it to their passengers.

Source: http://www.phuketgazette.net/phuket_news/2013/Phuket-airport-tackles-Chinese-tourists-immigration-queue-congestion-22673.html


-- Phuket Gazette 2013-11-01

[impulse]

So the solution is to put out more TM6 cards?

[Chicken George]

Easy answer stamp all passports 30 days if a visa waiver. What good are Tm cards anyway?

[cMe2]

Easy answer stamp all passports 30 days if a visa waiver. What good are Tm cards anyway?

In which Language was the video..? .Charter operators should have a stock of these Tm cards and I don't think if you are required to have one you can enter or leave the kingdom...due process

[fiberman]

Would it be that difficult to print the cards in Chinese, most of them don't speak English so they haven't a clue when they do get them .

[harrry]

Australia though its entry form has to be filled in in English has available cards in many languages which look like the form and have the translation. This makes it easier for the person to fill in the form correctly.

[JulesMad]

I do not speak/write Chinese! Can I have one in my own language as well?!?

[squarethecircle]

I've lived in China for the better part of a year and have not seen them form queues (well except once now that I think about it, at the Shanghai rail station). The Chinese style of queueing is push to the front of the line, every man woman and child for their self, if it means pushing in front of a 90 year old grandma then do so (well maybe not that extreme). So if they're actually queueing up then it's a good start.

[MantisMan]

I've lived in China for the better part of a year and have not seen them form queues (well except once now that I think about it, at the Shanghai rail station). The Chinese style of queueing is push to the front of the line, every man woman and child for their self, if it means pushing in front of a 90 year old grandma then do so (well maybe not that extreme). So if they're actually queueing up then it's a good start.

Or the usual thing to do, from my experience, is to pay someone to wait in line for you...............

[cbluck58]

even better - tell them to stay at home !

[JoeThePoster]

So it's not the one finger typing skills of the immigration officers causing the delay?

[bangon04]

Would it be that difficult to print the cards in Chinese, most of them don't speak English so they haven't a clue when they do get them:thumbsup: .

Even Thais have to fill out the cards in the English alphabet, don't they?

If you have a machine readable passport, why on earth do they need huge piles of extra paper ? Surely they can devise a computer programme to record the details direct from the passport?

As someone mentioned, Malaysia has done away with the extra paper. Strangely Hong Kong still has an arrival/departure card.

[MarkCyr]

Well, it sounds like it's just the Chinese tourists who are made to wait due to the incompetence of their airlines and tour-guide operators. I have no problem with that. At least they're not holding up everybody else. Do we all remember how that used to be? When 1 out of every 5 passengers was a d*ckhead who felt that it was OK to take 5 minutes filling out the card right in front of the officer, holding up the line? Annoying.

My hat is off to immigration in Bangkok for putting a stop to that practice. They now check to make sure you have a card filled out. If you don't, you don't get into the SECOND line up, in front of the officer booths. The idiots wait; you don't. I hope this is also what is happening down in Phuket.