Thai Visa situation for long stay tourists
I have been researching the different types of Thai Visa’s for the first time since I have been here. Before I was on a non-immigrant business visa – a one year multiple entry. That means I could go in and out of Thailand freely for a year as I have a registered Thai company and work permit. Now things are a little different as I will not be able to renew my non immigrant business visa when it expires as I have no company. This doesn’t leave me with many options, as a Non immigrant O visa, which let’s you stay in Thailand on a yearly basis is only available to people over 50 years old or people that are married to a Thai citizen.
So this basically leaves the Tourist Visa. A year ago the Tourist visa was simple and easy to understand and follow. You got a 30 days stamp in your passport when you arrived, when the 30 days was up you would go to the Immigration department and extend for another 30 days, then another. After this time you needed to go out of the country, for a minimum for 5 minutes and re enter to repeat the process.
The problem with this is that so many people were living and working in Thailand without paying tax, hence the new tourist visa rules. In a nutshell, you can only stay in Thailand for a maximum of 90 days out of a 180 day period.
This leaves me with a problem, as I’m sure I’ll want to spend more than 90 days out of 180 in the Kingdom. I have 2 options, to quickly marry a Thai girl and have some babies or to renew my non immigrant, multi entry business visa. This will mean opening another company and paying tax on my income on a monthly basis. Opening a company costs around 50,000 followed by accounts and tax which adds up to around 15,000 per month. So, if I want to stay in Thailand longer than 6 months out of the year I’ll need to go this route.
Has anyone else got any advice on other ways I can get around the new tourist visa issues?
Illigal? hmmm maybe not so good advice haha Or how about teaching english?
What’s illigal Lillian?
I am considering teaching English, something I’ve thought about for a while now, especially in the Essarn region where most schools do not have the budget for an Native English teacher. If they are able to help me get a visa, I’ll be preapred to work for free! I’d much rather give the poor kids an opotunity rather than work in a private school. I’m researching TEFL courses right now! hahaha
A joke a…enter Thailand illegally …. No seriously, most schools give you a visa if you teach english. Some schools might even pay you. Good luck finding the right visa !!