Permanent residency questions

[baywatch82]

Hi All,

I will be very appreciated if some of you will help me to answer following questions.

It is coming to the point, when I will have 3 years unbroken non immigrant visa soon, and I will want to apply for permanent residency.

I am working at international school in Chang Mai, my salary is 60k per month. My nationality is Polish. I have some investments in Chiang Mai already - 6 condominiums, with chanote title on my name (freehold). I can speak Thai in about 30%.

My questions are :

- am I eligible to apply for permanent residency ?

- under what category should I apply ?

- do I need to speak fluent thai to be able to apply ? read thai also ?

- what time of the year should I apply ?

- should I use any visa agency ?

- what are aprox. costs of applying ?

Thank you very much for your help. On internet I can find only very general information.

[Arkady]

Take a look here http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/en/base.php?page=residence. I believe you would have to apply under the general employment quota, i.e. not as an investor. But it says on 3.2.3 you need salary of 80,000 a month or income tax filing of 100,000 annually which makes no sense, since 100,000 a year is only 8,333 a month. I guess they meant to say salary of 80,000 a month or tax filing equivalent to 100,000 a month. That might mean you could qualify with a salary of 60,000 a month and rental income from your condos of 20,000 a month, if you have been paying tax on it. Seeing as the English on the Immigration website is so unclear, I would suggest you call or visit Immigration at Chaengwatana Bangkok to clarify whether you qualify or not. You have to apply in Bangkok and they have a department for PR only.

You need intermediate level spoken Thai but no reading or writing necessary. You have to pass a panel interview in Thai. They don't expect perfect fluency but ability to converse is needed.

The non-refundable application fee is 7,600. If you are approved you pay another 191,400 (95,700 if married to a Thai).

It's up to you, if you want to use a company to prepare the large amount of documents for you or do itself. As long as get the documents right, it is no disadvantage to do it yourself but there are a lot of docs.

Immigration usually opens for applications once a year for only 2 or 3 weeks in December. Last year it was delayed till January but that was unusual. You can follow announcements on Immigration's website or watch out here on Thai Visa.

Since it takes a long time to prepare all the documentation, it is necessary to start work several months ahead, e.g. now would be the right time to start work on an application in Dec 2015.

[arunsakda]

If you are renting your Condominiums be sure you are paying income tax as required by Thai law. Charity contributions are also positive point on the application. Every year I am making contributions to a certain organization and they provide stamped receipts.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Edited September 6, 2015 by arunsakda

[Arkady]

If you are renting your Condominiums be sure you are paying income tax as required by Thai law. Charity contributions are also positive point on the application. Every year I am making contributions to a certain organization and they provide stamped receipts.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Correct. Anyway they can only be counted if the income is included on notarised tax returns.

I am not sure if charitable contributions are required for PR. I certainly didn't submit any but things might have changed. However, they are definitely needed for citizenship and a good idea for PR too.

[THAIJAMES]

I think the 100,000 is the tax paid for that year.

[maisodni]

It is one thing to meet the minimum requirements to be eligible to submit your application, and it is another thing to score enough points to have your application be approved. There are ten scoring categories, with ten possible scoring points in each category, and you need to score above 50 points to be approved.

I am not certain what all the categories are, but the following are definately scoring categories:

1. Your age.

2. Your highest educational achievement.

3. Your Thai language proficiency.

4. Your recent income, and tax payments to Thailand.

5. Your history of charitable contributions within Thailand.

6. (One category specific to your basis for applying) In my case, nature of my employment

I suspect that the others were:

7. Knowledge of Thai government and culture.

8. Your personal practice of religious spirituality.

9. Your friends and/or family relationships in Thailand.

10. Your hobbies, personal interests, and anything else that makes you an interesting person.

The scoring for age is particularly odd. They have a "bell curve" that peaks at something like 46-49 years old. If you are in that age cohort, you get ten points. You then get nine points if you are 44-45 or 50-51 years old, eight points for 42-43 or 52-53, and so on. I'm not sure the exact peak age range, or how wide each "outer band" is.

I was approved with 57 points. I know that I scored zero on charity, and I also scored low on education (which really irritated me - I have a Bachelor of Science Degree in engineering - but it is from a national military academy, so they said it was "military training education", and disregarded it).

At least in Bangkok, if you apply with an "eligible" - but obviously "weak" packet - Immigration will generally suggest to you that you not proceed

- and they will tell you in what areas you should focus your efforts to improve your scoring.

Good Luck!

MS

Applied December 2011 - Approved July 2015

[gopis108]

AS farv as I understand there is not much advantage to having PR.in Thailand-I believe one still requires a work permit and re-entery permit etc.Please advise,Thankyou.

[chilli42]

You are not eligible to apply ... yet. You need 5 years of tax returns (somebody who applied recently told me this has been increased to 7 years - can't confirm). The process is very straight forward (nothing devious or hidden) but very tedious so any reliable legal or immigration service can handle. You don't need to speak Thai other than a few basic things - fluency not a requirement. You will need to round up your degree, university transcripts, clean bill of health from the national police in your country etc. Can apply any time but there is a quota by country established each year. If the quota is open no problem. If the quota for your country is full you need to wait until the following year. Seems the best way for you to apply would be directly for yourself and not as the spouse of a Thai national. Just talk to a Thai legal firm and get a facts - they will not charge for this. Then shop around and compair firms (services provided and price).

[chilli42]

AS farv as I understand there is not much advantage to having PR.in Thailand-I believe one still requires a work permit and re-entery permit etc.Please advise,Thankyou.

Yes it's true you need re-entry permits and work permit. The advantage is you can live in Thailand and not deal with the constant crap associated with visa runs etc. Also, getting a work permit is easy. Finally, best of all. you can get a drivers Licence for life with no renewal requirements ). Seriously though it's about peace of mind if Thailand is to be your long term home. the paperwork a nuciance but the cost is not a big thing.

[swissbie]

AS farv as I understand there is not much advantage to having PR.in Thailand-I believe one still requires a work permit and re-entery permit etc.Please advise,Thankyou.

Yes it's true you need re-entry permits and work permit. The advantage is you can live in Thailand and not deal with the constant crap associated with visa runs etc. Also, getting a work permit is easy. Finally, best of all. you can get a drivers Licence for life with no renewal requirements ). Seriously though it's about peace of mind if Thailand is to be your long term home. the paperwork a nuciance but the cost is not a big thing.

No, you can't get a driving licence for lifetime (tahlort cheep) anymore. Changed some years ago. It's five years now (not for first application).

[maisodni]

You are not eligible to apply ... yet. You need 5 years of tax returns (somebody who applied recently told me this has been increased to 7 years - can't confirm). The process is very straight forward (nothing devious or hidden) but very tedious so any reliable legal or immigration service can handle. You don't need to speak Thai other than a few basic things - fluency not a requirement. You will need to round up your degree, university transcripts, clean bill of health from the national police in your country etc. Can apply any time but there is a quota by country established each year. If the quota is open no problem. If the quota for your country is full you need to wait until the following year. Seems the best way for you to apply would be directly for yourself and not as the spouse of a Thai national. Just talk to a Thai legal firm and get a facts - they will not charge for this. Then shop around and compair firms (services provided and price).

Ths post contains incorrect inforfmation. The eligibility criteria to apply are published on the Immigration webste at: http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/doc/residence/26122546_regulation_notice_en.pdf - and it is still three years, not five years.

You do not need to speak fluent Thai - but you do have to face an interview board, and answer questions for about 10-12 minutes - and the questions start out in Thai language. If you are completely clueless about Thai language, they will switch to English - but you then lose all scoring points for Thai language proficiency.

There has never been a case yet when any country used up all its annual quota - so you can pretty well disregard that criteria. It mainly exists to prevent a flood of Chinese or Indian applicants from being approved in one year.

MS

[mike324]

Take a look here http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/en/base.php?page=residence. I believe you would have to apply under the general employment quota, i.e. not as an investor. But it says on 3.2.3 you need salary of 80,000 a month or income tax filing of 100,000 annually which makes no sense, since 100,000 a year is only 8,333 a month. I guess they meant to say salary of 80,000 a month or tax filing equivalent to 100,000 a month. That might mean you could qualify with a salary of 60,000 a month and rental income from your condos of 20,000 a month, if you have been paying tax on it. Seeing as the English on the Immigration website is so unclear, I would suggest you call or visit Immigration at Chaengwatana Bangkok to clarify whether you qualify or not. You have to apply in Bangkok and they have a department for PR only.

You need intermediate level spoken Thai but no reading or writing necessary. You have to pass a panel interview in Thai. They don't expect perfect fluency but ability to converse is needed.

The non-refundable application fee is 7,600. If you are approved you pay another 191,400 (95,700 if married to a Thai).

It's up to you, if you want to use a company to prepare the large amount of documents for you or do itself. As long as get the documents right, it is no disadvantage to do it yourself but there are a lot of docs.

Immigration usually opens for applications once a year for only 2 or 3 weeks in December. Last year it was delayed till January but that was unusual. You can follow announcements on Immigration's website or watch out here on Thai Visa.

Since it takes a long time to prepare all the documentation, it is necessary to start work several months ahead, e.g. now would be the right time to start work on an application in Dec 2015.

The OP does not look like he qualifies. One must pay taxes of 100,000 baht and up per year in order to qualify. Another poster said taxes payed dating back at least 5 years is correct as well. That is the most important thing that they look for. The rest they don't care much.

Company I work for try to apply for PR for a factory manager who has been here 10 years, he does not qualify because he does not pay enough tax.

[a99az]

Why would anyone from Europe want to exchange there passport for a Thai passport? Many disadvantages having a Thai passport and you have to denounce your former citizenship as Thailand will not allow you to keep you duel citizenship. Makes me wonder if those who do this have something to hide from.

[blackcab]

Why would anyone from Europe want to exchange there passport for a Thai passport? Many disadvantages having a Thai passport and you have to denounce your former citizenship as Thailand will not allow you to keep you duel citizenship. Makes me wonder if those who do this have something to hide from.

Completely wrong. Thailand allows dual nationality. Many European countries do too.

As an example, you can hold British nationality and Thai nationality at the same time.

[Rhys]

Why would anyone from Europe want to exchange there passport for a Thai passport? Many disadvantages having a Thai passport and you have to denounce your former citizenship as Thailand will not allow you to keep you duel citizenship. Makes me wonder if those who do this have something to hide from.

I thought the op was just apply for PR.. not apply for Thai Citizenship? I still do not see any real advantages of PR.... we still jump through the hoops..