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Immigration Promenada One Stop Service 2016-2017


Tywais

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2 hours ago, NancyL said:

By your own admission, E/S, you had all your documents in order when you elected to visit that business on the second floor of Prom. mall and paid them 3000 above the standard gov't fee for what, exactly?  The privilege of jumping the queue?  Not having to get up early in the morning?  Knowing you'd receive your extension that day and wouldn't be told to come back tomorrow.  What exactly did you get for your 3000 baht?  And is this service advertised or promoted anywhere on their premises?

 

 Nancy L please go to my activity file and pull a post and show members   the above false accusations that you have posted

  to nail  Nancy L  above false accusations, or assumptions  it is as follows, most importantly my retirement visa ext is not done yet ,as you have wrongly posted

line one....at no time  did E/S have his documents in order,and i only engaged G4T visa sevices for for my upcoming retirement visa  following their  completion of good work

in securing my tm30 ,90 day report,and my stamps transferred from old p/port to new one ,in one hit, they then immediately made the necessray  paperwork required when i gave them the go ahead,  and at no time paid the 3000 baht fee for my upcoming retiement renewal as you wrongly stated,  again please go to  HEADS UP PROMENADA G4T  THREAD post # 32 will confirm this,  in fact to fill u in, this will be PAID ,when i get the stamp in my passport after my retirement visa appointment, is completed which is penned in for 27/2

then E/S will give a full account of my experiences on my thread, HEADS UP PROMENADA G4T ,which will cover your lines two and three of your above post

to Mods , Member and Guests ,the above post is not a bickering issue at all,or a personal  attack on Nancy L, integrity, just honestly clarafiying her false assumptions or accusations  she made   about  E/S,  think i am entitled to that, at least hope so

a very nice afternoon  to all

 

 

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2 hours ago, scottiejohn said:

I am sorry Nancy L. I normally respect and like what you do but I, and am sure a few others,  take exception to your remarks that we must be clueless, need hand holding or are a first timer to use an agent. You and others might be quite happy getting up at stupid times of the day, wandering around shopping Malls, watching, films and eating overpriced crap at your favourite restaurant, but I do not. Nor do I wish to get up at that stupid time in the morning to go and sit on a plastic seat for God knows how long when I can get the same thing done a different way by getting up at a reasonable hour of the day (after 10AM at the earliest!) paying some money and get driven out to the ‘zoo’, when necessary, for all of a max of 20 mins and back in the local for lunch. To me that is the ‘no brainer’.  Not the act of a clueless etc person. Each to their own.

 

2 hours ago, scottiejohn said:
4 hours ago, NancyL said:

Visa agents do serve a valuable function for people who are clueless, need hand-holding, first-timers, etc.

 

scottiejohn, based upon all that Nancy has done & written about CM Immigration, I am sure that she would not regard you as clueless, etc etc.   I'm sure that what she meant to say was that visa agents should only have to be used by such folks as first timers etc etc, but unfortunately many others also feel compelled to use them to avoid the difficulties thrown up by CM Immigration.  Neither Jomtien nor CR Immigration (both of which I have used) throw up such roadblocks, and I have not heard of similar roadblocks at any other Immigration offices.

 

Lets give her a break for having the guts to write about the root cause of the problem:

This says it all Nancy: "..the problem wasn't one of simple incompetence or lack of manpower or resources, but documented (to the Consular Corp) what it really was and how much money it brought in each month..".

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30 minutes ago, OneZero said:

I am sure that she would not regard you as clueless, etc etc.   I'm sure that what she meant to say was that visa agents should only have to be used by such folks as first timers etc etc, but unfortunately many others also feel compelled to use them

As Judge Judy (or any other judge for that matter) would say; you do not know the working of somebody else’s mind. Leave her (Nancy L) to argue her own case and stop hiding under her skirts!

 

As  regards the 'clueless' comment;  she made it!

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1 hour ago, evenstevens said:

 Nancy L please go to my activity file and pull a post and show members   the above false accusations that you have posted

  to nail  Nancy L  above false accusations, or assumptions  it is as follows, most importantly my retirement visa ext is not done yet ,as you have wrongly posted

line one....at no time  did E/S have his documents in order,and i only engaged G4T visa sevices for for my upcoming retirement visa  following their  completion of good work

in securing my tm30 ,90 day report,and my stamps transferred from old p/port to new one ,in one hit, they then immediately made the necessray  paperwork required when i gave them the go ahead,  and at no time paid the 3000 baht fee for my upcoming retiement renewal as you wrongly stated,  again please go to  HEADS UP PROMENADA G4T  THREAD post # 32 will confirm this,  in fact to fill u in, this will be PAID ,when i get the stamp in my passport after my retirement visa appointment, is completed which is penned in for 27/2

then E/S will give a full account of my experiences on my thread, HEADS UP PROMENADA G4T ,which will cover your lines two and three of your above post

to Mods , Member and Guests ,the above post is not a bickering issue at all,or a personal  attack on Nancy L, integrity, just honestly clarafiying her false assumptions or accusations  she made   about  E/S,  think i am entitled to that, at least hope so

a very nice afternoon  to all

 

 

You're absolutely correct E/S -- I stand corrected.  I looked up the thread you mentioned:  

and see that you procured the services of G4T for a set of services that are even more basic than obtaining your annual retirement extension.  Glad you caught that.  As stated in your OP, your reason for doing this was that Imm. Prom. was "packed to the rafters".  Hmm, as I pointed out a few posts ago, ever wonder why that is?  If you spend any time there, you'll realize it isn't incompetence or lack of resources or manpower.  Ever wonder why people in other provinces can waltz in a take care of these tasks in under an hour?  

 

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4 minutes ago, scottiejohn said:

As Judge Judy (or any other judge for that matter) would say; you do not know the working of somebody else’s mind. Leave her (Nancy L) to argue her own case and stop hiding under her skirts!

 

As  regards the 'clueless' comment;  she made it!

Oh good grief.  I didn't say that everyone who uses a visa agent is "clueless".  I said they can serve a valuable purpose in assisting people like newbies, those who want handholding, the clueless, etc.  This wasn't an all-inclusive listing of their customer characteristics.  

 

I will say that it's very wrong that people have to invest 3000 baht (or more) to save four or five hours (or more) for their annual visa extension when the "contact time" in the Imm. office for other provinces in less than 60 minutes.   This is a situation made by CM Imm. and not the fault of "clueless" people.

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5 hours ago, NancyL said:

Visa agents do serve a valuable function for people who are clueless, need hand-holding, first-timers, etc.

 

35 minutes ago, NancyL said:

Oh good grief.  I didn't say that everyone who uses a visa agent is "clueless".  I said they can serve a valuable purpose in assisting people like newbies, those who want handholding, the clueless, etc.  This wasn't an all-inclusive listing of their customer characteristics

You did say it was for people who are ....etc

Please see my new topic re agents, and leave this topic to advice on immigration requirement etc.

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come on now bring the true story out

over the years a person worked on the old trick like trump 

scaremongering on new comers or old people had trouble with forms 

but i can help you when you join my club and feasts 

so they believe

there are expats in towns all over the world 

get caught by the street smart in the town

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1 hour ago, NancyL said:

Oh good grief.  I didn't say that everyone who uses a visa agent is "clueless".  I said they can serve a valuable purpose in assisting people like newbies, those who want handholding, the clueless, etc.  This wasn't an all-inclusive listing of their customer characteristics.  

 

I will say that it's very wrong that people have to invest 3000 baht (or more) to save four or five hours (or more) for their annual visa extension when the "contact time" in the Imm. office for other provinces in less than 60 minutes.   This is a situation made by CM Imm. and not the fault of "clueless" people.

Have you never stopped to think that it might be because there are more foreigners in Chiang Mai than these other provinces of which you speak, especially the retired variety, which I believe is where the longest delays are occurring? Speaking to a friend of mine in Bangkok recently, he surprised me by telling me that there are often early morning queues in Chaeng Wattana these days too so it isn't just in Chiang Mai. You might think you're doing the local expat community a service but you could be doing more harm than good with your constant stirring.

 

Whether the situation is due to real problems or, as you claim, imagined ones that are used to steer people toward a certain agency, tea money is a fact of life in Thailand so there's no point getting worked up about it. If you wish to take it as a personal affront you can but it happens between Thai people far more than it does between Thais and foreigners. It makes me wonder who you think you are, to come to a foreign country and think you have some God-given right to tell them how to go about their business. I remember when I was in the oil & gas industry, doing business with arabs was a constant pain because they  always wanted backhanders from our chosen suppliers. However, that is the way that they do business over there, they don't regard it in the same way as we do in most Western countries - it's perfectly acceptable in their culture. Much the same situation exists here, although not quite so bad, but it isn't a concerted effort to rip off one particular group of people, it's the way life works in Thailand. You either deal with it or, as you are doing, you leave. But ranting and raving about it on public Internet forums does none of us any good.

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2 hours ago, Mark123456 said:

Have you never stopped to think that it might be because there are more foreigners in Chiang Mai than these other provinces of which you speak, especially the retired variety, which I believe is where the longest delays are occurring? Speaking to a friend of mine in Bangkok recently, he surprised me by telling me that there are often early morning queues in Chaeng Wattana these days too so it isn't just in Chiang Mai. You might think you're doing the local expat community a service but you could be doing more harm than good with your constant stirring.

 

Whether the situation is due to real problems or, as you claim, imagined ones that are used to steer people toward a certain agency, tea money is a fact of life in Thailand so there's no point getting worked up about it. If you wish to take it as a personal affront you can but it happens between Thai people far more than it does between Thais and foreigners. It makes me wonder who you think you are, to come to a foreign country and think you have some God-given right to tell them how to go about their business. I remember when I was in the oil & gas industry, doing business with arabs was a constant pain because they  always wanted backhanders from our chosen suppliers. However, that is the way that they do business over there, they don't regard it in the same way as we do in most Western countries - it's perfectly acceptable in their culture. Much the same situation exists here, although not quite so bad, but it isn't a concerted effort to rip off one particular group of people, it's the way life works in Thailand. You either deal with it or, as you are doing, you leave. But ranting and raving about it on public Internet forums does none of us any good.

Most sensible post so far on this subject.very intelligent assessment of people's gripes.you would think they would get a life.there so boring. And full of themselves

 

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On 2/14/2017 at 8:40 PM, EricTh said:

 

The problem is that there are many first-timers who don't know the exact procedures and they have nobody to turn to except the agents.

 

The printed broken English doesn't help and the English skills of the interns need to be vastly improved.

 

So there is a need for the agents but jumping queues would still be considered illegal if money were taken by the officers without going to the government bank account first.

 

I don't agree. With the help of people such as Nancy L & others as well as looking at the IM site, I did not need any agent to help my extension of stay for retirement the first time or the years thereafter

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14 hours ago, scottiejohn said:

I am sorry Nancy L. I normally respect and like what you do but I, and am sure a few others,  take exception to your remarks that we must be clueless, need hand holding or are a first timer to use an agent. You and others might be quite happy getting up at stupid times of the day, wandering around shopping Malls, watching, films and eating overpriced crap at your favourite restaurant, but I do not. Nor do I wish to get up at that stupid time in the morning to go and sit on a plastic seat for God knows how long when I can get the same thing done a different way by getting up at a reasonable hour of the day (after 10AM at the earliest!) paying some money and get driven out to the ‘zoo’, when necessary, for all of a max of 20 mins and back in the local for lunch. To me that is the ‘no brainer’.  Not the act of a clueless etc person. Each to their own.

Yeah, no brainer indeed- as in willing to be forced to pay for a "private" firm to obtain governmental service above and beyond the government fees to comply with governmental regulations. 

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10 hours ago, true blue said:

Most sensible post so far on this subject.very intelligent assessment of people's gripes.you would think they would get a life.there so boring. And full of themselves

 

Much Ado About Nothing? I went to Promenada last month for my extension after 12 years in Thailand. There are perhaps hundreds more people needing services than in 2005+ so I can no longer waltz in any time of day and be done in less than an hour, sometimes ten minutes. So, I arrived this year like last at 6AM. My passport copies and form were filled out in advance, about five minutes to do that. I enjoy walking around the mall and sometimes have a little coffee. Only dimly aware that these third party visa services exist. I was 3rd in line and finished by 9AM, delightfully pleasant time and little inconvenience. I thoroughly enjoy the opportunity to spend a day in CM cruising the malls, having a new food adventure, and sometimes making great friends. I've been blissed out and blessed out of my socks since the day I first arrived in Thailand. Immigration has always been informative and helpful if a bit rushed at times. Of course, arriving out of nowhere and not knowing the language may result in some confusion and a few rough spots initially, but I've never lacked for help. It made a big difference when I found the most adorable Thai woman I've ever seen who speaks both fluent English and Thai. Nowhere else in the world can you stumble over so many beautiful women and warm hearts. Thaivisa and other Internet forums/blogs have helped me keep abreast of things and ease me over a few rough spots.  

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14 hours ago, Mark123456 said:

Have you never stopped to think that it might be because there are more foreigners in Chiang Mai than these other provinces of which you speak, especially the retired variety, which I believe is where the longest delays are occurring? Speaking to a friend of mine in Bangkok recently, he surprised me by telling me that there are often early morning queues in Chaeng Wattana these days too so it isn't just in Chiang Mai. You might think you're doing the local expat community a service but you could be doing more harm than good with your constant stirring.

 

Whether the situation is due to real problems or, as you claim, imagined ones that are used to steer people toward a certain agency, tea money is a fact of life in Thailand so there's no point getting worked up about it. If you wish to take it as a personal affront you can but it happens between Thai people far more than it does between Thais and foreigners. It makes me wonder who you think you are, to come to a foreign country and think you have some God-given right to tell them how to go about their business. I remember when I was in the oil & gas industry, doing business with arabs was a constant pain because they  always wanted backhanders from our chosen suppliers. However, that is the way that they do business over there, they don't regard it in the same way as we do in most Western countries - it's perfectly acceptable in their culture. Much the same situation exists here, although not quite so bad, but it isn't a concerted effort to rip off one particular group of people, it's the way life works in Thailand. You either deal with it or, as you are doing, you leave. But ranting and raving about it on public Internet forums does none of us any good.

Jomtien processing nearly three times as many retirement extensions per year as Chiang Mai and the customers of that office don't report the need to use visa agents to obtain timely services.  

 

Interesting report of your experience in working in the oil & gas industry in an arab country.  Was it with an American firm?  I think not.  I worked in the chemical industry for an American company and we were bound by U.S. gov't rules that prohibited such activity overseas.  If you follow Thai news, you'll find that many of the large Thai corruption cases, like the Bangkok International Film Festival corruption scandal just became to obvious to ignore after U.S. officials charged Americans involved under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangkok_International_Film_Festival

 

 

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2 hours ago, NancyL said:

Jomtien processing nearly three times as many retirement extensions per year as Chiang Mai and the customers of that office don't report the need to use visa agents to obtain timely services.  

 

Interesting report of your experience in working in the oil & gas industry in an arab country.  Was it with an American firm?  I think not.  I worked in the chemical industry for an American company and we were bound by U.S. gov't rules that prohibited such activity overseas.  If you follow Thai news, you'll find that many of the large Thai corruption cases, like the Bangkok International Film Festival corruption scandal just became to obvious to ignore after U.S. officials charged Americans involved under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bangkok_International_Film_Festival

 

 

It's a Quality management issue to design process' & procedures which maximize efficiency for both the organization & the customer. Providing quality will increase customer base & vice versa.  Customers will evaluate the cost vs service quality and decide where to conduct business.  There will of course be decisions in both directions.  Chiang Mai does not have to reinvent the wheel in order to provide it's customers with a better quality experience.  Jomtien Immigration (for the approx 10 years I observed them) provides an excellent benchmark for CM Immigration to learn from and emulate, but it seems that CM Immigration does not have sufficient incentive to do so.

 

My Jomtien experience with 90 day reports has never required greater than a 30 minute wait, usually far less.

My Jomtien experience with renewing retirement visa is like an assembly line, consistently as follows:

I wait approx 2 minutes to be served by one of the young female volunteer college interns to look over my paperwork, & she hands me a number.  I wait 5-10 minutes to see an official employee who verifies that my paperwork is indeed in order.  He hands me a number and tells me to return at a later time to pick up my completed passport (either later the same day or the following day depending on what time I was there).  So far this has never taken me more than 30 minutes, one time I timed it at 7 minutes total.  

When I return at the later time, with my number to pick up the completed passport, the efficiency is also evident.  Again a very short wait to see the official employee, but an extra minute or two are required because they may take a picture of you when you pick up the passport.  Again, this has never taken me more than 30 minutes, one time I timed it at 10 minutes total.

 

Edit: PS, there are a hell of a lot of customers flowing in & out quickly..  So there can be no valid argument that Jomtien has fewer customers or I just had a lucky day.  Also, there were only one or a few employees working at the different desks providing the different services Immigration offices provide.  It was the quality process' / procedures they  have designed making it a very tolerable experience.

Edited by OneZero
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39 minutes ago, OneZero said:

It's a Quality management issue to design process' & procedures which maximize efficiency for both the organization & the customer. Providing quality will increase customer base & vice versa.  Customers will evaluate the cost vs service quality and decide where to conduct business.  There will of course be decisions in both directions.  Chiang Mai does not have to reinvent the wheel in order to provide it's customers with a better quality experience.  Jomtien Immigration (for the approx 10 years I observed them) provides an excellent benchmark for CM Immigration to learn from and emulate, but it seems that CM Immigration does not have sufficient incentive to do so.

 

My Jomtien experience with 90 day reports has never required greater than a 30 minute wait, usually far less.

My Jomtien experience with renewing retirement visa is like an assembly line, consistently as follows:

I wait approx 2 minutes to be served by one of the young female volunteer college interns to look over my paperwork, & she hands me a number.  I wait 5-10 minutes to see an official employee who verifies that my paperwork is indeed in order.  He hands me a number and tells me to return at a later time to pick up my completed passport (either later the same day or the following day depending on what time I was there).  So far this has never taken me more than 30 minutes, one time I timed it at 7 minutes total.  

When I return at the later time, with my number to pick up the completed passport, the efficiency is also evident.  Again a very short wait to see the official employee, but an extra minute or two are required because they may take a picture of you when you pick up the passport.  Again, this has never taken me more than 30 minutes, one time I timed it at 10 minutes total.

 

Edit: PS, there are a hell of a lot of customers flowing in & out quickly..  So there can be no valid argument that Jomtien has fewer customers or I just had a lucky day.  Also, there were only one or a few employees working at the different desks providing the different services Immigration offices provide.  It was the quality process' / procedures they  have designed making it a very tolerable experience.

We are not considered customers.

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Not in an attempt to defend management of Chiangmai Immigration (which, in my view, is generally rather poor), a part of the problem is lack of personnel.  A couple of Octobers ago, CM Immigration officers gave a speech to the CEC (expats club) and they pointed out with their charts how many matters the Chiangrai office handled versus the Chiangmai office.  In every category, CM handled many more matters and, for extensions and 90-day reports, CM handled 3 to 4 times as many matters as the Chiangrai office.  Why is this relevant?  Well, when asked which office had more Immigration officers, the answer was: Chiangrai.  Doh!

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2 hours ago, Mark123456 said:

Yes it was an American firm, at least the parent company was, and everybody was fully aware of what was happening. I've no idea how it works nowadays but if you wanted to build offshore oil platforms for arabs in the 80s/90s, you either accepted that's what was going to happen or you didn't get the contract. To be clear, I wasn't working overseas, I was a buyer based in the construction company's office. But really, my point was that it is accepted in certain cultures - they don't see it as a dishonest/despicable practice. What I think about it isn't really relevant but for the record, I turned down cash bribes when I was offered them.

 

I used to be very precious about my principles but then I realised that sometimes it's OK to bend them occasionally rather than spend my life fighting whatever system I happen to be living under - I don't see myself as a tireless crusader, here to educate the locals. I understand why you dislike the idea of being forced to pay for services you don't think you should have to use but for the sake of 3,000 THB a year, I would not uproot my family and move to a different country. You may say I'm enabling the problem and you are probably right but I'm not going to crucify my family on my principles for the sake of what is basically small change. If it's a matter of principles, both you and I should return to our home countries and tackle corruption there before we think about putting the rest of the world to rights. The record of politicians in the UK/USA is far from unblemished - consider Chicago for example, or the Westminster MPs who were caught claiming expenses for marble bathrooms in their second homes etcetera. And these are supposedly fully developed nations....

Agree totally with what you say but most of these people come from either bankrupt European Union countries or bankrupt America, countries that can not do simple mathematics accountancy balance the books from the top of their governments, then should we listened to the people from the same countries that allow such foolish behaviour to go on. Take them seriously No not on this forum, If they come from any of the above countries I certainly don't.

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Went to Prominada yesterday .

The free green bus is no more , its stopped running .

Went there for a tourist visa extension

Got there just before 4 PM 

The lady behind the desk filled my application form out for me , all I had to do was sign it , I handed in my passport and got it back within ten minutes , with the extension

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27 minutes ago, sanemax said:

Went to Prominada yesterday .

The free green bus is no more , its stopped running .

Went there for a tourist visa extension

Got there just before 4 PM 

The lady behind the desk filled my application form out for me , all I had to do was sign it , I handed in my passport and got it back within ten minutes , with the extension

Thanks for your report

Sorry to hear about the Shuttle

Gee you were lucky

Maybe she had nothing to do

Took sympathy on you

Good to know you got your extension

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I went for a 90 day report today. 

Arrived 3pm, the checkers firstly pulled out the foreign info forms and said we no longer need them.

 

Sat down and was called immediately....there was no one there, infront or behind me!

 

Actually there didnt seem to be that many people there at all today which is a surprise after the weekend.

 

3.10pm  walking back to my bike done and dusted.

 

just saying that you really dont need to bust a gut setting your alarm for 5am!

 

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22 hours ago, eyecatcher said:

I went for a 90 day report today. 

Arrived 3pm, the checkers firstly pulled out the foreign info forms and said we no longer need them.

 

Sat down and was called immediately....there was no one there, infront or behind me!

 

Actually there didnt seem to be that many people there at all today which is a surprise after the weekend.

 

3.10pm  walking back to my bike done and dusted.

 

just saying that you really dont need to bust a gut setting your alarm for 5am!

 

That's how it always was for me at the Airport, just walk in any time at first, but then later you were out if you didn't get a queue ticket, tough luck. Now, some say it's easy to get done at Promenada, too, but maybe not always. I have a 35k drive times two that has to be repeated if it's not a hit, so it's safer for me to get there by 6:30AM and really no trouble, plus I've got all day to have fun in town. 

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1 hour ago, cusanus said:

That's how it always was for me at the Airport, just walk in any time at first, but then later you were out if you didn't get a queue ticket, tough luck. Now, some say it's easy to get done at Promenada, too, but maybe not always. I have a 35k drive times two that has to be repeated if it's not a hit, so it's safer for me to get there by 6:30AM and really no trouble, plus I've got all day to have fun in town. 

Or simply send it by post?  1507625.GIF

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On 2/17/2017 at 1:15 PM, sanemax said:

Went to Prominada yesterday .

The free green bus is no more , its stopped running .

Went there for a tourist visa extension

Got there just before 4 PM 

The lady behind the desk filled my application form out for me , all I had to do was sign it , I handed in my passport and got it back within ten minutes , with the extension

 

I wonder why they stopped the green bus.

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