Visa And Work Contract Dates Discrepanciesallowed?

[Dutchy]

Visa and work contract dates discrepancies allowed by Thai law?

Just a question, is it possible to get a non imm. O visa that ‘outlives’ the duration of a work contract. For instance, the contract expires on April 31st and the visa on June 31st. Is this legitimately possible?

Dutchy

[Indo-Siam]

Hi Dutchy -

The visa (obtained from a Thai diplomatic post outside Thailand) is unrelated to a work permit - they have no relation. You can be inThailand for 10 years - or forever - after your last visa expires.

What matters once you are inside Thailand is your ENTRY PERMIT - a stamp in your passport issued by a Thai Immigration officcer.

A work permit will - to my knowledge - never be issued with an expiration date that falls after expiration of your current entry permit.

If you obtained a one-year entry permit extension based on "support of a Thai spouse" - and the later got a job with an entry permit - the work permit for the job would be issued for a period that would expire on or before expiration of your entry permit - depending on how long a work permit validity you (or your employer) paid for.

It is entirely possible to pay for and receive a 90 day (or six month) work permit, and have it expire in advance of an entry permit extension - IF THAT ENTRY PERMIT EXTENSION WAS ORIGINALLY BASED ON SUPPORT OF A THAI SPOUSE (probably in association with a Class O visa).

An long-term entry permit extension based upon an initial entry using a Class O visa may be based upon demonstration of adequate funds - and will normally be for a year. They compute out whether you meet a standard, based on cash you demonstrate that you will have during a 12-month period. If that calculated amount is achieved over less than the 12 months, they will not require demonstration that your income steam will continue all the way to month 12.

The "target figure" is presently 200,000 baht, rising in July to 400,000 baht.

Good luck!

Steve Sykes

Managing Director

Indo-Siam Group

Bangkok

[email protected]

www.thaistartup.com

[Dutchy]

HI Steve,

Thanks for your reply, I was referring to non imm. O visa aquired inside the country that expires two months after the work contract expires. The Thai spouse doesn't play a role here, I just wondered that there's a two month gap in work contracts and new visas. I can figure out why they did it but wondered whether it's legitimately possible. I would think that immigration issues visas for the time a foreigner works in the country, ten months work, then a ten months visa.

What's your idea about this?

Dutchy

[Indo-Siam]

Hi -

As far as I know, there is no such thing as a Thai "visa" issued inside Thailand. By definition, a "visa" is something that authorizes you to enter a country - thus it must be issued from outside the country.

I suspect that you are talking about a non-immigrant entry permit. Look at the stamp - if it includes the words "admitted" and "until" (or "stay permitted up to") then it is an entry permit. If it has a Garuda emblem anywhere on it, then it is a visa - no Garuda, then it isn't a visa (Garuda because issuing authority is a Royal Thai Embassy).

Cheers!

Steve

[lopburi3]

As far as I know, there is no such thing as a Thai "visa" issued inside Thailand. By definition, a "visa" is something that authorizes you to enter a country - thus it must be issued from outside the country.

Immigration Department has authority to issue visas inside Thailand and they have been doing so recently for those who need to change from tourist to non immigrant and extend on basis of retirement and marriage AFAIK. There have been a number of posts from those who have obtained visas in this manner.

Our old simple rule of visa outside country no longer is completely valid.

[Dutchy]

Hi -

As far as I know, there is no such thing as a Thai "visa" issued inside Thailand. By definition, a "visa" is something that authorizes you to enter a country - thus it must be issued from outside the country.

I suspect that you are talking about a non-immigrant entry permit. Look at the stamp - if it includes the words "admitted" and "until" (or "stay permitted up to") then it is an entry permit. If it has a Garuda emblem anywhere on it, then it is a visa - no Garuda, then it isn't a visa (Garuda because issuing authority is a Royal Thai Embassy).

Cheers!

Steve

HI Steve,

I checked it, it says:

********** Immigration Office

Application of stay permitted up to .....

I do have a couple of them in my passport and they're all based on the original non Imm B visa that I obtained in Penang, many years ago. The question is still, is this extension based on the workpermit which is based on the work contract or not?

I'm still interested in knowing whether immigration can arbitrarily extend non imm B visas not based on work contracts. That seems illogical..

Cheers,

Dutchy

[Indo-Siam]

Hi Dutchy -

Work contracts are not a requirement fir getting an entry permit extension based on employment. What is required is just qulaifying employment, for a qualifying employer. If you have a work permit, earn a qualifying salary, and your employer has sufficient capitalization and Thai employee headcount, you get a long-term extension.

Beginning with your first one-year renewal of an entry permit extension, the extensions are simply made for one calendar year - period. If an employment contract winds down during that year, Immigration will generally not be aware of that. But when your employer turns in your work permit for cancellation, that will normally trigger a sequence that leads to your entry permit being revoked - they typically give you seven days or so to leave the country.

So- do not fixate on the expiration date - it is actually an "expire at the latest on this date" - but if your work ends, so does your entry permit - by revocation.

Lopburi - I have heard about Immigration "spontaneously" issuing both retirement-based and marriage-based extended entry permits - without recipients having first obtained a visa outside the country. But - I have never heard of Immigration issuing a "visa" - visas are the sole perogative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As I understand it, Immigration could no more issue a visa than it could print Thai currency, or issue a work permit, or a VAT registration card, or an airline pilot's license. We are talking about ministerial/bureaucratic functions - and Immigration is not involved in issuing consular documents. It seems that 99% of the people on this board mistakenly use the word "visa" interchangeably with "entry permit" - as in talk about "visa extension" (there is no such thing - a visa cannot be extended - only an entry permit can be extended). But - maybe there is some recent protocol for Immigration running pasports to MFA to obtain a visa - I've yet to hear about it. It seems EXTREMELY unlikely to me. But Immigration deciding to simply conjur up an extended entry permit, without an underlying visa - that would seem completely possible to me.

Good luck!

Steve

[lopburi3]

MFA Official Web Site Visa Page

I stand by my statement and offer the above link to the statement of authority for Immigration Department to issue visas; along with MFA and Embassy/Consulates. They can (and from reports do).

You are right that most people do confuse the extension of stay with visas but the old 'never' is not true anymore.

Add: Believe they only use this authority to issue a visa to replace a different type obtained from an Embassy/Consulate at this time. In cases reported a tourist visa was changed to non-immigrant type.

[Sadayu]

It is possible to change your visa ype from within Thailand, though it is difficult and circumstantial (Then again that seems to be the way of immigration in gen.)

I changed from a Tourist to an NI-B at office in Bangkok as I got offered work here. You have to have all the paperwork required for the NI-B, have at least 30 (or was it 60?) days left on your current visa - I had to apply for an extention at the same time - and then visit the notorius "Room 303" - visa change room - for interogation.

I'll eventually end up with a 1 year NI-B visa with entry stamp = to last day of my signed work contract / work permit validity. They purposely syncronize them, so it is not posible to have a visa outside of a work permit validity perhaps. Then again this isn't the NI-O situation....

FYI

[Indo-Siam]

Hi Lopburi -

Well, I will agree to one thing - the MFA web page does clearly state that Immigration Bureau is one of three authorities to issue a visa.

But - looking down the page, there is only one mention of Immigration is relation to visas - under "Regulations governing issuance of non-immigrant B visa," Section III, Subsectio 3.3 - and it says only that Immigration can change the classification of an existing tourist or transit visa - presumably to a ClassB stsus - in order to issue an extension.

I would view this as being "the process of extending a Tourist (or Transit) visa for purposes of employment", and not "the process of Immigration issuing Class B visas" - but I can see how someonre else might take the other view.

I myself last entered Thailand on a Class O (spouse) visa - which has now been extended for several years on the basis of employment. I don't consider that my visa was changed from Class O to Class B - the entry permit is simply an extension of non-immigrant visa for purposes of employment.

Cheers!

Steve

Indo-Siam

[lopburi3]

Well, I will agree to one thing - the MFA web page does clearly state that Immigration Bureau is one of three authorities to issue a visa.

I also used the "never in Thailand" answer and found it hard to believe when folks started saying they were able to "obtain a non-immigrant visa at immigration" rather than making the run to a nearby consulate. But the MFA site seems to show that it could be done so have "modified" my replies now to include that as an option.