Question On 60 Day Tourist Visa Limits

[Paul9989]

I know that Thailand no longer will issue multiple 60 day tourist visas at overseas consulates. There is also that law where you cannot remain in the country for more 90 days on tourist visas during a 6 month period.

But a friend of mine said he believes that the 90 day limit within a 6 month period is limited to people who are entering Thailand on 30 day tourist visas upon entry.

He said he believes that, although you can't get multiple 60 day entry visas anymore from overseas, you can still enter Thailand for 60 days on a 60 day visa, then extend for 30 days while you are here, and at the end of the 90 days you can go back overseas, obtain a new 60 day visa from a consulate or embassy, and re-enter Thailand right away.

If he is correct then you would be able to actually stay in Thailand longer than 90 days within 6 months on tourist visas. Is this correct in that the 90 day within 6 month limit only really applies to using 30 day tourist visas upon entry?

[sunnyjim5]

There is no 90 day in 6 month "law" You are mistaken

Tourist visas can be easily obtained from Thai Embassy's in nearby countries.

[BritTim]

Hard and fast rules

The 90 day within 6 months rule for visa exempt entries was scrapped long ago.

There is no official limit on the number of back-to-back single entry tourist visas you can get.

Practical limitations

On entry into Thailand, the computer system does some checks and may alert the immigration officer to do more thorough vetting of the entry. In particular, the IO receives ab alert if many visa exempt entries exceeding some threshold have been made in some unclear period of time (yes, vague). The alert is not an instruction to deny entry. In fact, nothing in the immigration law allows them to deny entry based on the number of visa exempt entries previously made. However, suspicion of working or insufficient finances may be used as a pretext to officially deny entry. Also, some IOs at land borders will unofficially deny you entry saying the computer told them to do it.

There are also indications that the computer system is tracking tourist visa entries and extensions. My own suspicion is that we are going to see alerts based on them used for greater scrutiny in future.

Depending on embassy/consulate, there may be problems getting tourist visas after previous ones, either globally or from that specific location.

[elviajero]

• There is no limit to how long you can stay here. As long as you are issued with a tourist visa you can enter and stay for 60 days. That stay can also be extended by 30 days.

There used to be a rule limiting visitors entering with visa exempt entry to 90 days in every 180 days but that was cancelled in 2008. Although the rule still appears on some Embassy websites.

[Paul9989]

Great, thank you. All clear.