60 Day Tourist Visas

[gregchambers]

I currently have a dozen 60-day tourist visas in my passport. About half are multi-entry from the UK, the others single entry from Penang, Laos and Cambodian. They are not quite back to back as I stay in the UK for 1-2 months every year (single visit).

I read somewhere on this forum that tourist visits are going to be limited to 180 days out of a year, which if they started today and were backdated would keep me out of Thailand for the next six months!

I will be back in the UK in Nov, so am wondering if the usually compliant consulate will have any problems issuing me a multi-entry tourist visa this time round. I could get a new passport as there are only four pages left in my current one!

BTW I do not have any income from Thailand so am not actually trying to break the law.

[ovenman]

I read somewhere on this forum that tourist visits are going to be limited to 180 days out of a year, which if they started today and were backdated would keep me out of Thailand for the next six months!

The new regulations only apply to entry without visas.

I will be back in the UK in Nov, so am wondering if the usually compliant consulate will have any problems issuing me a multi-entry tourist visa this time round. I could get a new passport as there are only four pages left in my current one!

Many, if not all, of the consular offices in nearby countries are currently limiting tourist visas to single entry. I'd bet that a friendly consular office back home will continue to be helpful.

That said, there has been some noise in the past week about a new directive that states individual consulates are able to issue only two tourist visas per year to an applicant but it's not entirely clear just yet what this is all about. My suggestion would be for you to ring up your favourite consular office back in the UK and ask what they are currently issuing.

[gregchambers]

Consulate actually seems to be last in line to hear any new visa reg's!

Hope the visa timing does not get as complex as say NZ which says you can't stay more than nine months out of eighteen months AND that you have to stay out of the country for as long as you previously stayed in it on a tourist visa.

Oddly, getting tourist visa to UK for Thai girlfriend has gotten easier over the past few years!

Probably going to retire back to the UK anyway come the new tax year as these Thai girls have totally pissed me off and I can't be bothered any more but don't particularly want to have to pay out money to stay somewhere more expensive than Thailand for the next four/five months.

[ovenman]

Consulate actually seems to be last in line to hear any new visa reg's!

That might not be a bad thing for you if the consulate is still operating under all the old assumptions.

[gregchambers]

Yeah, problem is I won't be there for a month and it seems anything can happen in 30 days in Thailand re visas.

I can acutally get around it by getting a non-O three-month visa (Dec, Jan, Feb) by pretending I want to retire to Thailand and then spending the last month (March) elsewhere (angeles city in the PI the way I am going!) and finally getting back to the UK at the beginning of new tax year in April! But I have perfected the art of minimum expenditure and maximum sex in Thailand!

I may be the only near 50-year-old actually looking forward to life in Blighty rather than LOS (but then I started young here!). You will not find me sad any more at Bangkok airport.

I bet readership of the visa section is way up compared with a year ago, seems like you can't miss a day!

[ovenman]

Yeah, problem is I won't be there for a

month and it seems anything can happen in 30 days in Thailand re visas.

That's the underlying problem facing many punters in a nutshell. No telling what things will be like a month from now, three months from now, or even next week. All a person can do is drive themselves crazy pondering all the what-ifs.

I bet readership of the visa section is way up compared with a year ago, seems like you can't miss a day!

It's a regular soap opera.