John Galt Presents: Visa Enforcement

The new Visa regulations are starting to gain some inertia. Looks like the Thai Immigration organization is going to take a real stab at enforcement the new regulations.

I'll tell you why this is going to end up being a real SNAFU later in this article but for now, let's concentrate on the detail and understand the basics of the regulations.

For simplicity, we are only going to take a hard look at the Tourist Visa because it's these guys are who are affected greatly. I don't have any details on investment Visa and to tell you the truth, I had never heard of it before recently so I don't know anything about that type of Visa. I personally hold the normal one year Non-Immigrant B (Business) Visa. The rules surrounding the Non-B Visa have essentially not changed, so we'll focus on just the Tourist Visas.

I made some adjustments to my publication after I posted it on the 28th. Some of the points between the arrival stamp and the VOA were confused and BangkokBob (BangkokBob.net) was nice enough offer up some clarification. Getting it right is important and I certainly don't mind "eating crow" when required.

First, there are 3 types of Tourist entry methods. There is basic entry stamp (no Visa at all), or VOA (Visa on Arrival) and there is the normal Tourist Visa (obtained outside the country).

The arrival stamp is issued to you (placed in your passport) when you arrive in Thailand. This is automatically given to foreign nationals that are on the approved list for this type of entry (click on the document on the right for a closer look at that list). This entry has always been just a 30 day entry and most tourists typically only get the entry stamp when they land in Bangkok OR cross a boarder with an adjacent country. There is no charge for this. Those making short "Visa runs" monthly typically get that type of entry.

The real VOA is issued upon arrival at places like the Bangkok airport. I don't have an example of that type of Visa. I know what it looks like for Laos. Laos just uses a stamp in your passport for that Visa. (furthermore, I am told the VOA will are only available to those from: Bhutan, China, Cyprus, Former Czechoslovakia, Hungary, India, Kazakhstan, Maldives, Mauritius, Oman, Poland, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, or The Ukraine. (is it possible there there is no Thai Embassies in those countries?)

The normal Tourist Visa is a sticker that is placed in your passport and you apply for it at a Thai Embassy outside of Thailand. You can be inside your home country and apply for it OR you can be in an adjacent country like Laos, and apply for it. It's takes normally a day to be processed and the Tourist Visa gives you a maximum of 60 days to be in the Kingdom.

This is just a list of those who can qualify for Visa Exemption entry stamp.

These 2 Visas above are the choices for Tourism. The stamp is automatic (for those citizens whose country are automatically qualified) and it's good for 30 days. The real tourist Visa must be applied for at a Thai Embassy abroad and it takes one full day for processing and it's good for 60 days.

The Visa on Arrival (VOA) is free. The normal tourist Visa costs a few bucks. In this case $15 USD.

Here are the current Visa regulations. It is a copy of the brochure that I was given in my local area. This a copy of the original and it's a little fuzzy but you can read it. It's fairly short and it's laid out to be simple.

The prime restriction is that any foreigner can not be in the kingdom for more than 90 days during any 6 month period. That is how I read it.

If you stay consecutive terms, that would mean that you can get 3 entry stamps for a total of 90 days and at that point you must leave for 90 days before you can return and do it all over again.

Ok, this is the very simple version. If done in consecutive order, it's easy to manage. Not a problem.

What if you don't do it in order? What if you first take a 2 entry stamps for 60 days, and then go across the boarder for a full tourist Visa? Are the girls in the Embassy going to catch that you only have 30 days left? Or maybe that is really 33 days since you crossed the boarder a bit early to get that last renewal? Whoa, now this is some work. Hum...

But what if you came into the country for 15 days, went home and came back 45 days later with a full 60 day tourist Visa? Now when exactly does the 90 period of entry really begin? Man, this is tough. The answer is there somewhere but some poor middle aged boarder patrol guy has to figure it out. It's already takes them about a minute just find and verify one stamp! How in the hell are they ever going to sort out the mess of counting days through months that all have a different number of days in them? Let's see, add 15 days for the tail end of January, plus 28 days in February, but wait, you left on March 3rd for 3 days and came back. Oh, brother. It will be a mess.

The only way this FIRST problem can be removed is through computer aided entry. It is true that they have computers at entry points. Do they now have software to track everybody? Or would they just hunt down all the stamps in your book and "connect the dots"? All the information is in your passport. No doubt about that, but wait -- Oh no, you lost your passport? You you have a new passport now? Well, that looks like a clean slate to me unless of course a Thai computer system holds all your data. Now that would be a real international software challenge.

When you create a system that handles customers, you have to be keenly aware of the hidden problem that the customer will accidentally make for himself.

What happens if you fly into Bangkok for a plain entry stamp and then realize that you've come back too soon? What are Thai authorities going to do? Put you in a holding cell until you can buy a plane ticket home? Somehow I doubt it. The first news story of a stunt like that will give the country a black eye.

What if you miscalculate the number of days on a across the board trip to Cambodia. Are they going to lock you out of the Kingdom when you try to return? Again, very bad PR. I strongly believe people are going to bitch and do so very loudly.

The only really answer to keeping unwanted people out is making everybody apply for full Tourist Visas at consulates. Does Thailand really want to do away with entry stamps or the automatic VOA? I don't think so - normal tourism would suffer terribly.

It has been stated that those on the current 1 year Visa for retirement, investment, and such will be "grand-fathered" in. How are they going to keep track of that from year to year? The logistics are prohibitively complex. Any slick lawyer can get this year's paperwork to look like last year's paperwork.

These law changes are designed to scare off the some of the unwanted guests. This is the first thing that is going to happen. Thailand will also loose some of their most valuable guests as well. This will begin to happen during high season as January is the first 90 days deadline that looms in the distance for the perpetual Thai squatter.

Secondly, the law will end up be selectively enforced against a targeted group of visitors. I highly suspect that boarder enforcement will tend to "look the other way" for obviously decent guests. I can't be 100% sure of it at this point, even the boarder immigration people aren't 100% sure right now.

Please take notice of a section of the brochure called "Decentralization". This is an interesting area. Up to this point when anyone gets the 1 year Visa for business, retirement, marriage (there are a number of them), these longer term Visa have always been approved centrally in Bangkok. Now, the change is to decentralize the decision making. Basically, this means that regional officers can sign off on non-Tourist 1 year type Visas. This is basically an opening of Pandora's Box for "under the table" Visa approvals. Why do you think they centralized this before? My guess is that Bangkok decentralized the approvals because they expect a huge amount of work to be created with the intense restrictions of the Tourist Visas and entry stamps.

Local lawyers with "juice" and a penchant for securing friends inside the Visa office will be securing more 1 year Visas for people who normally might not qualify otherwise directly through Bangkok. You better believe that this will likely spill over into "under the table" 60 day tourist Visas as well.

Again, let me caution you, that I can't be 100% of this, but this has been the case in the past. Typically when there is a bottleneck of tourists who want to stay, the people who are now part of the "decentralized processing" will try to accommodate you, for a fee of course

When the true futility of tracking Tourist Visas begin to emerge, and it will, I think you'll see the enforcement of the "new rules" wane. It shouldn't take that long. We may even see this start to happen before the the first drop dead date of January 1.

For those of you who are here continuously, work it out that you apply for a 60 day tourist Visa in Vientiane Laos. Apply for that Visa sometime in late November or early December. See if that consulate actually counts the days and limits you to the drop dead date of January 1. Hopefully, they won't. See if you in fact get the full 60 days and it passes over the Jan 1, then you can sit back and find out what actually happens on the Jan 1st date.

Seek out a strong lawyer and ask her/him what the options may be. No doubt these people are working double time to accommodate the onslaught of Visa activity.

The "spirit of the law" is to benefit the people. As a backup plan, you might consider moving out of the high density areas Bangkok/Pattaya and living somewhere else on the fringe like Rayong, Ko Chang, etc. You might find that in these areas may actually want your business and in exchange, they will look the other way and offer you repetitive Visas. The only way to know is to travel there and check it out. The "decentralized" decision making will certainly make it more possible to cozy up to the officials in these places.

Just wait it out. Even if your Visa expires on Jan 1, just don't do anything for a couple of weeks and over-stay the Visa. If push comes to shove and the restrictions are not relaxed, then you'll need to make your departure and just pay the over-stay fees. I'm sure there will be many paying the over-stay fees. If the restrictions relax - do a Visa run and again, pay the over-stay fees.

I personally know someone who was on overstay by only a few days. He checked into a hotel in Bangkok for the night and was flying to Malaysia the next day. The plane ticket was in his wallet. The hotel staff noticed he was on overstay and called immigration and he was arrested. Because this happened on a Friday, he had to spend the whole weekend in an immigration lock-up in Bangkok before being fined and escorted to the airport on the Monday.

I had know several people who over-stayed their Visas with no problems but it is possible that the laws may be selectively enforced against those who have not made it to the board yet.

I can't say for sure how it's going to go but a few years ago, the government was going to enforce the limit on 30 day entries to 3 per year (or per six months, I can't quite remember). They were NOT going to count days, they were only going to count the number of 30 days entries inside one year. That didn't work out. The new change is more complicated, so I can only expect that this change won't work either.

Perhaps, they are making these rules so the police can selectively enforce the law against only the undesirables?

Put all this information in your hopper and mull it over. Don't just listen to what I say, I may only be partially right. You should talk to a lawyer and some others who may be "in the know". It is also extremely likely that we just won't know what will happen until the time comes. This is a frequent occurrence in Thailand so you'll need to be prepared either way.

Thanks for your visit. I hope my opinion has been helpful to you. Good luck to you.

This is a normal entry stamp. This is my first stamp in my passport. This is the first day that I set foot on Thai soil, June 16th 2001. You also see my departure stamp. I stayed about 8 days.
I took a one month trip out of the country and received this normal tourist Visa in Los Angeles. This is a normal 60 day tourist Visa. I used this to return to Thailand in 2002. This wasn't the right Visa for me but I was missing business paper work at that time and this was all I could get.


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