My Visa Run To Penang

[geoffphuket]

Hi to everyone,

Well, another visa run completed to Penang, so that's that for another 15 months - Non imm 'O' 12 month multiple entry visa again thanks to Haji Jabar at the NJ book centre/visa agent....phew!

As ever, I always learn something doing this trip; this time I discovered that it's no good turning up at HatYai at 4:30pm on a Sunday expecting to get on a minibus to Penang. During the week it's no problem, but at a weekend arriving after 2.00pm so I'm told, is just too late. An expensive lesson learnt as I ended up paying 1,800 Baht for a taxi to Georgetown!! As the saying goes 'you live and learn'....Next time I'll do an overnight bus trip from Phuket and get to HatYai early.

Georgetown (Penang) never seems to change much; I personally quite like the place and it's certainly cheaper than Phuket for food and accommodation; beer is arguably more expensive – but there again I don't drink, so that's no problem...I find it refreshing to get away from pickup trucks (you don’t see any in Penang), broken roads and dangerous overhead power cables. It always strikes me what Malay’s must think when they cross the border in to Thailand for the first time – it’s like stepping back into the 20th century.

Anyway, happy to be back on Phuket with my Thai wife and baby.

Geoffphuket

[Dasant]

Hello! im new to this forum and.....I have a question about visa runs. I require a Non imm "O" 12 month multiple entry visa - im here on just the standard 1 month visitor visa you get on entry and have renewed it a few times (via cambodia). I was married here to my Thai wife ove a month ago and we have registered our marriage here in bangkok, she is now pregnant! (yeehaw) As i live in Bangkok im wondering if you know the closest place i can go to get it done???

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Cheers m8

[visarunner]

Probably the easiest possibility is Penang/Malaysia.

Vientane/Laos or PP/Cambodia are closer , but difficult to get any visa.

You can also consider KL/Malaysia or Singapore , lot's of cheap flights .

Edited August 25, 2006 by visarunner

[Dasant]

Thanks alot, appreciate the advice - will look into it right away, i will be flying back to Australia in September through Singapore so maybe i'll do it there? also i require a work permit...can this be done at the same time or will i need to apply for it once i have returned to Thailand from the visa run?

Cheers

[clivemh]

Hello! im new to this forum and.....I have a question about visa runs. I require a Non imm "O" 12 month multiple entry visa - im here on just the standard 1 month visitor visa you get on entry and have renewed it a few times (via cambodia). I was married here to my Thai wife ove a month ago and we have registered our marriage here in bangkok, she is now pregnant! (yeehaw) As i live in Bangkok im wondering if you know the closest place i can go to get it done???

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Cheers m8

Hi I live in Pattaya,and I also praise NJ bookshops, they are great! [email protected],They will pick you up at Penang airport,and drive you back,you can fly by AirAsia cheaply,during the week,get a 7am flight,and get a return the next day afternoon.There are lots of cheap hotels down the street where NJs is, I stay at the Hong Ping Hotel.Just contact them tell them you need a multi entry visa,and they will do the rest,you don't even have to visit the Consulate,they take care of everything. I was told about them, and everyone should know how good they are for us Expats!

[andyst]

Just got back from Penang with my new Non-Immigrant ED visa and thought I'd share a few thoughts on top of what geoffphuket already shared. I got a price of 10.7 baht per Ringgit, so in the interests of laziness, when converting, I considered the rate 10:1.

Flew to Penang on Wednesday morning using Air Asia, at 1,649 Baht one way. Arrived slightly later than scheduled, but enough time to get to the Thai Consulate on Wed. This was where I made my first mistake. On arriving (around 10:20), I should have booked the return ticket for Thursday evening from the AA counter in the airport (I didn't originally book a return ticket in case the flight was delayed and I missed the consulate on Wed morning ). So I took a taxi straight there (38 Ringgit, almost 400 baht for 30 minutes in a taxi!!!!), the Indian guy who stands by the gate is nice and helped me fill in the form.

Then off into Georgetown. 12 Ringgit in a taxi from the consulate, and spent a pleasant afternoon walking around one of the nicest cities I've ever been to. I booked my return ticket at a travel agents on Chulia Street on Thursday afternoon, at a cost of 281 Ringgit - about 800 baht more than if I'd've booked in the airport. Anyway after a few hours walking around, and looking at a few of the better looking budget guesthouses, I decided to check into the Hotel Continental on the reccomendation of several posters on this forum (80.5 Ringgit per night). The room was comfortable, the sheets were clean, it's fairly cheap and breakfast is included.

On Thursday I had breakfast (arived at 10am and the only things left were eggs, bread and baked beans - egg and beans on toast it was then!). Then went out again into Goergetown, caught a few trishaws around the city and saw a few of the landmarks. If there is a more relaxing way to travel than a trishaw then I'm yet to find it. Took plenty of pictures, to show that I'd been somewhere, then headed off back to the consulate. I made a deal with the taxi driver to take me there, wait for me to pick up the visa and then take me to the airport afterwards for 40 Ringgit. He was with me for about an hour and a half, so not a bad deal really (I think).

All in all, a pleasant way to spend a few days. The food is fantastic (especially the Indian food), the city is beautiful, the people are friendly and they generally speak excellent English. I got the visa and made it home in one piece. If I did it again, there are several things I would do differently though.

- As I said if you know you will make the consulate in time (before 12 pm), book the return flight for the following afternoon when you arrive at the airport. Alternatively, you can prebook a return ticket and spend three days in Penang, so that even if you miss the consulate on the day you arrive, you can just get up nice and early on the next day. This is probably a good idea - but unfeasable for me as I was working on a budget.

- Also I spent alomst 1,000 Baht on phone calls on Wednesday trying to call and text Thailand and England using roaming on my 1-2-Call SIM. Then on Thursday morning, I accidentally walked into a Malaysian mobile phone shop. I walked out with a SIM card from a Malaysian company called DiGi. The SIM was 12 Ringgit and came with 15 Ringgit credit already loaded onto it. The cost of a call to Thailand was around 0.5 Ringgit/minute and England about 0.6 RM/min. Very cheap and I can wholly recommend this to anyone who has to make any calls whilst in Penang.

- I would also use an agent if I went again. It was always on the back of my mind that my application might be declined, even though all the paperwork was in order. I think using an agent would have allowed me to relax a little more. There was a guy at the airport offering his services for 100 Ringgit, plus the 200 Ringgit visa fee, but I thought it was a bit to much and I thought he looked a bit dodgy anyway. Many other forummers have offered their thoughts on NJ Bookstore and another one (I can't remember their name), both are easy enough to find, on either side of the Swiss Hotel on Chulia St.

- Also I budgeted for about 10,000 Baht, but the total cost was closer to 14,000, so it's best to have a little extra in your pocket (Bank on Ayudyha told me that they charge a fee of 100 Baht if you use an ATM in Malaysia, not sure how much the Malaysian bank would charge though).

That's about all I can think of. Sorry to the seasoned visa runners, who probably know all this information already, but I just wanted to put a few things that I thought would be helpful to anyone looking to do this in the future. This was my first (and I hope my last) visa run and I was quite worried about it beforehand, but sitting at home now I can honestly say, despite the worry, it was a good way to spend a couple of days and I hope to go back to Penang on holiday for a few days with my girlfriend early next year.