Total Duration Versus Stamps Controversy

[threelegcowboy]

The RED STAMP is here now!

I posted several days ago about a red stamp issued to a friend and now I hear of another. This is a preview of what is about to happen. They are not going to strand anybody at the airport or the boarder with too many 30 day stamps.

My prediction on available knowledge is:

Oct 1 immigration at all entrys will look into incomming passports and make a quick decision about how many stamps the holder has. When they are over the limit they will be given a RED STAMP put in a profound spot (like the first page). This RED STAMP says " Upon exiting Thailand you MAY NOT be permitted to reenter"

So this person would have a month and maybe an extension to go pack his bags or try to get a another type of Visa.

HOPE THIS HELPS THOSE IN NEED.

LLL

[wpcoe]

Upon exiting Thailand you MAY NOT be permitted to reenter

Here we go with ambiguous semantics again:

Does "may not" mean "might not", or does "may not" mean "will not"? Let's face it, the meaning could be either, so what is the intent of that red stamp?

[threelegcowboy]

Upon exiting Thailand you MAY NOT be permitted to reenter

Here we go with ambiguous semantics again:

Does "may not" mean "might not", or does "may not" mean "will not"? Let's face it, the meaning could be either, so what is the intent of that red stamp?

The intent of the red stamp is a warning to go ahead into Thailand and make plans to leave. When you do leave you have 90 days or should have a new Visa. If you show up at the boarder the immigration officer can use his own judgement on whether to let you in.

Another case I saw some time back was immigration got pissed at the person and put an + above the persons head on his passport. I am sure that at every immigration check point that person got extra attension.

LLL

[Soju]

Let us look at some examples and how travellers may be affected by the new immigration requirements, entry stamp 30 days.

1 The traveller who travels to Bangkok once a month for 3 days every month, he/she is a genuine tourist. He /she will have 12 entry stamps in a year.

2 The tourist who comes to Thailand and stays a total of 44 days and then leaves for 44 days, then returns for 44 days. He/she does not have 90 days in 180.

3 The tourist who stays 30 days and does 2 visa runs a total of 90 days.

1 and 2 are not affected by the new requirements, 3 is affected and either has to stay out of the country for 90 days or get a 60 day tourist visa from a Thai Consulate.and one should not forget the financial requirements that may be enforced on entry /re-entry to Thailand.

The genuine tourist will not be affected.

No, according to what seems to be the most prevelent line of thinking, you are limited to 3 stamps, each with a maximum of 30 days during a six month period. So actually all 3 of your cases are affected by the new requirements!

Let's look at them one-by-one...

1. The traveller enters for 3 days each month. Let's assume he enters each month on the first day of the month for our example, beginning with January 1 (stamp #1). Entering on February 1 gets him stamp #2. When he enters on March 1, he's used up all 3 of his stamps and after leaving on March 3 must wait almost 4 months, until July 1, to be able to re-enter. This most definitely affects him. I'm in this same position and will have to cut out over half of my planned trips if it goes through.

2. The traveller enters for 44 days starting January 1 (stamp #1). But he only has a 30-day, non-renewable stamp, so he must do a border run on January 30, at which time he gets stamp #2. He then leaves Thailand on February 13, making 44 days. He then returns on March 29 (44 days after February 13) and gets stamp #3. But again being he's staying for 44 days, he must make a visa run on May 11, but he will be denied re-entry then because he already has 3 stamps.

3. As you already stated, he's also affected.

So as you can see, MANY tourists WILL be affected by these new rules if they're implemented as Sunbelt and many others have said they will be.

[bkkandrew]

<IE ---- on Oct 1st do they look at the next entry being #1?>

This is our understanding.

this seems to confirm it.

http://www.asianpacificpost.com/portal2/ff...hailand.do.html

From October, tourists from the designated countries can still enter Thailand without visas

Each permitted time shall not be exceeding 30 days period, and the total period shall not be exceeding 90 days from the first day that the passport holder arrived in Thailand.

The Immigration website says the same

http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/2notice/newpro.html

90 days... but the logic they have is 90 days that you are granted.

You use only one day out of 30 days, still counts as 30 days as you were granted that right. So the logic is no confusion.

I know people don't want to hear it. I understand that. I wish they would make it clearer on the website as well.

Here is from the same article which quotes Suwat Thamrongsrisakul, he head of the bureau,

http://www.asianpacificpost.com/portal2/ff...hailand.do.html

and stay for up to 30 days, but their entry stamps will be renewable twice at most for a maximum stay of 90 days.

Tourists who stayed for 90 days must leave the kingdom for at least 90 days before being permitted to re-enter Thailand, Suwat said.

Other press seem to be saying the same thing

http://news.google.com/news?sourceid=navcl...24841&hl=en

www.sunbeltasiagroup.com

sorry but this is not clear .... lets forget what the press reports as they seem as confused as the rest of us .. but the official document says SEVERAL times and not more than 90 days in 6 months ...

now forgive me for being stupid but if the 3 VOA was the official line wouldnt it say 3 and not several ???

if it is 3 strikes and your out i expect and lot of friction at the airports and a quick review to goto the 90 days rule instead

i suspect we willl see how this will all unfold after october 1st ...

must just say that the press and relation department of thai immigration should be officially sacked for this whole fiasco as has already been said the confusion will almost definately cause people not to book flights here

idiots

As opposed to being "unofficially sacked"?

[Soju]

I've seen conflicting reports about if countries which only get 15 days via the VOA are affected by the new rules as are the countries which get 30 days on a Visa Waiver. Also, two countries, Brazil and Korea get a 90-day Visa Waiver, but it's unclear if they are also restricted by the same ruling. But let's for a moment assume all of them are restricted to the same maximum 90-day period per 6-months, where you count any unused days on your VOA / Visa Waiver as being used, which is what Sunbelt is saying will be the case.

There are basically four levels of visa requirements for citizens of different countries entering Thailand as follows (from worst to best order):

1. Visa always required

2. VOA allowed which will give you 15 days

3. Visa Waiver allowed which will give you 30 days

4. Visa Waiver allowed which will give you 90 days.

Supposedly, Thailand is giving the most preferential treatment to group 4, and very little to group 2. But ironically the new rules, under my assumption, will have just the opposite effect for frequent travellers. They will be able to enter Thailand as follows:

2. Maximum of 6 15-day VOA's per six months

3. Maximum of 3 30-day Visa Waivers per six months

4. Maximum of 1 90-day Visa Waiver per six months

So this begs the question, can citizens of groups 3 and 4 elect to be treated the same as their supposedly inferior (inferior meaning only with respect to entry requirements) neighbors belonging to group 2? For a lot of us frequent travellers, it makes much more sense to be able to get a VOA and be able to enter for up to 6 times per six months rather than to have our entries limited to only 3 using the Visa Waiver. I don't think I've ever used more than 15 days of my 30-day Visa Waiver. Six entries per six months still isn't enough for me, but it's certainly way better than only three.

Anyone with any sort of a logical mind can take one look at this situation and see that no thought has gone into this new ruling. I doubt there are many visitors travelling between Brazil and Thailand given their geographic distance. But there certainly are very large numbers of Koreans visiting Thailand. Korea has made an extremely generous entry policy for Thai citizens (the same 90-day visa waiver as Thailand gives to Korean citizens). Beyond the third-world and SEA countries, Korea is one of only a few countries that allow Thais to enter without a visa. Don't imagine they'll be very pleased to hear that in spite of their generosity Thailand is treating them as such. Again, this is based on my assumption which may or may not be correct as I've yet to see any official word stating if they are included or excluded from this new ruling.

[zeusbheld]

I would also state that if they don't make it clearer, some Immigration officials will be counting days and other will be counting stamps at other checkpoints.

my expectation is that, regardless of how clear they make their statement, or how the policy mutates, some immigration officials will be counting days, and others stamps...

[Colonel_Mustard]

Let us look at some examples and how travellers may be affected by the new immigration requirements, entry stamp 30 days.

1 The traveller who travels to Bangkok once a month for 3 days every month, he/she is a genuine tourist. He /she will have 12 entry stamps in a year.

2 The tourist who comes to Thailand and stays a total of 44 days and then leaves for 44 days, then returns for 44 days. He/she does not have 90 days in 180.

3 The tourist who stays 30 days and does 2 visa runs a total of 90 days.

1 and 2 are not affected by the new requirements, 3 is affected and either has to stay out of the country for 90 days or get a 60 day tourist visa from a Thai Consulate.and one should not forget the financial requirements that may be enforced on entry /re-entry to Thailand.

The genuine tourist will not be affected.

No, according to what seems to be the most prevelent line of thinking, you are limited to 3 stamps, each with a maximum of 30 days during a six month period. So actually all 3 of your cases are affected by the new requirements!

Let's look at them one-by-one...

1. The traveller enters for 3 days each month. Let's assume he enters each month on the first day of the month for our example, beginning with January 1 (stamp #1). Entering on February 1 gets him stamp #2. When he enters on March 1, he's used up all 3 of his stamps and after leaving on March 3 must wait almost 4 months, until July 1, to be able to re-enter. This most definitely affects him. I'm in this same position and will have to cut out over half of my planned trips if it goes through.

2. The traveller enters for 44 days starting January 1 (stamp #1). But he only has a 30-day, non-renewable stamp, so he must do a border run on January 30, at which time he gets stamp #2. He then leaves Thailand on February 13, making 44 days. He then returns on March 29 (44 days after February 13) and gets stamp #3. But again being he's staying for 44 days, he must make a visa run on May 11, but he will be denied re-entry then because he already has 3 stamps.

3. As you already stated, he's also affected.

So as you can see, MANY tourists WILL be affected by these new rules if they're implemented as Sunbelt and many others have said they will be.

I took a friend from Hong Kong, who has a son at boarding school in Phuket and comes to visit him every weekend, to visit Phuket immigration and their take on things would seem to suggest that type 1 & 2 visitors would be unaffected. He stated that they were trying to clamp down on extended visits, not frequent visits.

However, there seem to be different versions coming from different sources, so we'll have to see what happens. I think most of the immigration officers are able to quickly see from a look at your passport whether you are looking to extend your stay beyond the norm, or jsut visiting for short periods of time on a regular basis.

Edited September 17, 2006 by Colonel_Mustard

[cclub75]

Something surprises me : why people don't call immigration services, locally and abroad ? Or send e-mail, or fax ?

Why we don't go overthere, to ask what are the details of the new regulations ?

If hundreds or thousands of people try to get bit of information. By doing a synthesis we would have a pretty clear view of the situation...

Or we would expose the fact that neither the thai officials know what to do exactly...

It would be a good test.