How To Apply For A Thai Id Card?

[digitele]

To all, Help!

Heres the situation in brief:

1) Wife is US Citizen with copy of Thai Birth Certificate.

2) Has never had a Thai ID Card.

Where do we even start? It will for many reasons simplify our live's!

Any one else out there have any experience with this?

Thanks in advance to any advise and/or help

[Crossy]

To all, Help!

Heres the situation in brief:

1) Wife is US Citizen with copy of Thai Birth Certificate.

2) Has never had a Thai ID Card.

Where do we even start? It will for many reasons simplify our live's!

Any one else out there have any experience with this?

Thanks in advance to any advise and/or help

Where are you (well your wife), US or Thailand?

[samran]

I was like that. Born in OZ, Australian citizen by birth, Thai by descent due to my mother being a Thai national.

The Thai embassy issued me a birth certificate, in addition to the Australian one that I have. The Thai birth certificate clearly says on it I am a Thai national also. I then had a Thai passport issued.

If your wife was born in Thailand, she will have a BC issued by her local Ampur. It will have on it her Thai ID number. If she was born in the US, she will have one issued by the embassy and unlikely to have an ID number on it. Not that is matters much.

Are you currently in the US?

If yes, the first thing she should do is apply for a Thai passport at the Thai embassy in Washington. She should then travel to Thailand, entering into Thailand on that Thai passport.

She should then do the following. She needs to find a relative who is happy to put her name on the tabieen baan, or the house regstration book. You need the permission from the head of the house hold to do this.

All of you, will need to go down to the Ampur of the house to get her registered. There are numerous forms to fill in.

If she was born in Thailand, she should already have an ID number issued to her. Her name will already be on the 'central' register. It will then be a matter of transfering her name off the central list to the house ID. Once this has done, she should be able to get the ID card.

There will be questions why she hasn't got an ID card (it is illegal for Thai's not to have one). Explain to them that your wife has been living in the US and has only recently returned to Thailand. Show them the Thai passport with the stamped entry into Thailand, and that will resolve that problem and avoid the small fine.

If she was born overseas, then it is unlikely that she'll have an ID number, so the ampur will have to issue one. Again, they'll want to see the birth certificate and the Thai passport with the entry date. The ID number will be generated on the central database, and then the name will be transfered to the tabieen baan, after which the ID can be issued.

A couple of points to stress:

- The house hold owner needs to be there to grant permission for them to be on the house book.

- The process does take a bit of time, so if you can do it in Bangkok, things should be faster and probably less burecratic.

- The Ampur, for god knows what reasons, may ask how she lived in the US without a visa in her Thai passport. IF and only IF they ask this, tell them that your wife has dual nationality. This happened to me. Now, as I have said ad nausium on this site, non-immigration department officials seem to have it in their head that having dual nationality is illegal. So they'll assume that her Thai citizenship is actually null and void cause she chose the US citizenship (ergo...no ID card for her). It used to be this way, but the law has changed many years ago.

Fortunately in my case, the offical at the ampur had the forsight to ring and check with the immigration people whether it was possible to have dual nationality, and the immigration people confirmend this. If this happens to you, have the phone number of the immigration department down at suan phlu ready and insist that they ring the number.

In my case it took a couple of days, each day something happened, but I was forced to come back as another bit of paperwork was approved by a higher ranking officer. Of course, a box of swiss chocolates in my case to the person who helped me out helped grease the wheels!

[sriracha john]

Start with the Sriracha Municipality Office on Sukhumwit... (going south as you enter into town) it's on the right side just before the intersection with Soi Wat Wanghin.

Edited June 12, 2006 by sriracha john

[digitele]

To all,

in short she knows where to go (1st step) and says there is like 3 steps involved. I will keep track of the process for others.

Thanks to all for your help, especially Samran.

Keep you posted after we go to BKK. Cheers

[farangene]

Our case was different from yours but there might be some info that could be useful.

A few years ago we returned to Bkk to live after many years in the US. My US (and Thai) citizen wife lost her ID in the US and her Passport had expired. She was born here and still regisitered in a house register in Bangkok.

Went to the local Amphur and got some BS from some petty official in the Amphur who told her she could not do it, etc. She contacted a "prominent friend" who paved the way with a phone call to the Amphur.

Next visit to the Amphur, no BS and she was treated like a dignitary. She got the ID card in less than an hour. Sometimes you have to use your contacts if you want to get something done in Thailand. I think she also had to get someone to sign a paper that said that they knew her for a long time.

Off to the Passport office and she applied for the PP. She picked it up a week later. This part was painless except they misspelled her name in Thai and that had to be changed.

Dual citizenship is recognized by both Thai and US Govt.

[lopburi3]

Dual citizenship is recognized by both Thai and US Govt.

No they do not recognize dual citizenship in law; but they both have no laws against it so it is accepted.

[digitele]

Our case was different from yours but there might be some info that could be useful.

A few years ago we returned to Bkk to live after many years in the US. My US (and Thai) citizen wife lost her ID in the US and her Passport had expired. She was born here and still regisitered in a house register in Bangkok.

Went to the local Amphur and got some BS from some petty official in the Amphur who told her she could not do it, etc. She contacted a "prominent friend" who paved the way with a phone call to the Amphur.

Next visit to the Amphur, no BS and she was treated like a dignitary. She got the ID card in less than an hour. Sometimes you have to use your contacts if you want to get something done in Thailand. I think she also had to get someone to sign a paper that said that they knew her for a long time.

Off to the Passport office and she applied for the PP. She picked it up a week later. This part was painless except they misspelled her name in Thai and that had to be changed.

Dual citizenship is recognized by both Thai and US Govt.

Thanks, thats seems so true (anticipated) about can't do etc. We have a "prominent friend" a relative who will attest all. As it is a holiday we'll go to BKK tomorrow and begin the "Process"

on wednesday. To all, much thanks again. Please any additional advise - Let Rip!

[digitele]

Update!

Went to BKK last week-started process on Thursday. She got her Thai ID Card in 36 hours!

Main Point(s)

* Had her 3 brothers confirm her ID (lucky they still are in the Amphur of their birth - all)

* The ID Card is in her maiden name. The process to change to my last name sounds like a vision quest of steps. Don't need to really and it's her name.

Thanks to all for the advise.....