khongaeng

Yes, I think Thai bank systems are becoming more flexible to middle names lately. I opened a bank account at each of the 5 top banks in Thailand last year, and I think only one had an issue with my middle name. It might have been SCB. In that case, I think they just put my first and middle names together with a space as my first name. All other Banks didn't have any issues with my middle name. My middle name has never created a situation that I wasn't able to open an account or apply for something.

Non-O visa and work permit are separate. I was unemployed, then employed by a Thai company, then employed by my own company all while maintaining an extension of the original Non-O visa. Be careful where you get a work permit from, because when you apply for citizenship, you will have to provide various documents from your employer (letter of employment, PND1, and possibly others). It your employer is a pseudo-company that just provides work permits for foreigners, they probably won't provide you with the required information, because they will most certainly not want to bring unwanted attention to their grey-zone arrangement with foreigners to provide work permits. You may consider opening your own company. Taxes, accounting fees, visas, WPs and everything included will cost you about 4000 EUR per year to open and maintain a company (based on my own experience). If you do your own accounting, except for the annual audit, you can save considerably, but it all depends on how much effort you want to put into the process. If you have your own company, you can generate the required paperwork whenever you want, and even adjust your salary to get more points (but also pay more tax).

I'm married to a Thai and SB asked me to sing in order to make sure that I got all of the language fluency points. Apparently they won't make you sing if you are comfortably over the limit of 50 points. I guess I was just at the cut off point. I was not asked to sing at the MOI interview. If you are not yet on a Thabian Bahn then you can't even apply. Supposedly you are supposed to get 5 points if you are on a house registration for 5 years, but they did not give me those points even though I was on a yellow book for 5 years. You do not need to be registered for a minimum amount of time (if you are married to a Thai). I think the points in the residency section are geared towards Permanent Residents. In the end, it doesn't really matter so long as you make the cutoff. If SB asks you to pay the 5000 baht to lodge your application, it means that you have the minimum required points (they won't take your application fee unless you make the cut).

That sounds about right given most people's recent timelines. My documents were at MOI for 30 months before I finally got called for an interview. The process is incredibly slow. I reached out to SB once every couple of months and MOI once every couple of months during my application process and it didn't help at all. Fortunately this forum provides clear documentation that the application process works. I remember how painful the waiting process was thinking how can it be this way after paying so many Baht in taxes and after doing this and that for the country and the community that I live in. Don't worry about it. Your application is making progress, just let it run its course. It will take 3-4 years give or take half a year. This is normal. Good luck!

To me that question is asking if have you changed your citizenship. To which the answer is no, because you have merely acquired another citizenship. You still are a US citizen and file your income taxes yearly. Your country of residence probably also hasn't changed if you have been claiming residency in Thailand on your US taxes.

I had my visa cancelled at the immigration office as well, but they didn't stamp cancelled over the visa and re-entry in the passport. Rather they wrote in Thai (taking the usual full page of my previous nationality passport). "This person received Thai nationality according to the the Royal Gazette posting xxxxx on date xxxxx" signed by the person in charge that would normally sign visas. The documents I took with me were my Blue Thai ID card. Royal Gazette copy and Naturalization paper. They didn't keep any originals and actually made copies for free (shocking)! My European friend that had immigration police show up at his door 2 years after his visa expired also had a similar handwritten note in his passport.

Funny story. My European friend who got his citizenship the same time as I did was out of town a couple of weeks ago and 3 immigration police show up at his house, asking his wife where he was. His wife explained to them that he had received his Thai citizenship all the way back in 2021, and that he had gotten his visa cancelled at immigration immediately after getting his blue ID card. They explained that somehow their team was different from the visa department and that they never received word that my friend had acquired Thai citizenship. His wife gave them a copy of his ID card and they went happily on their way. I thought it was interesting to find out that even if you go through all the right steps of cancelling your visa, etc. Immigration may still come looking for you. This is the first time I have heard about something like this happening, which means that in all other cases, Immigration must not be bothered enough to check on people that have "overstayed" their visa. Apparently they came with their police cars and 4 officers, as if they were ready to haul him away to immigration prison. Even within Immigration, I guess one department can't be bothered to let the others know about immigration status. It is a miracle that our applications are able to make it through the process at all to obtain Thai nationality.

No, your new Thai name will not automatically be used on your new ID card. All of the paperwork and Royal Gazette announcements will have your foreign name on them. You will first get your ID card in your foreign name, at which point you could have the option to change your name to the Thai name you reserved at the start of your application. Your new Thai name is never used a single time in any paperwork after the day you request it as just part of the process that you are required to do.

If you have a Pink ID card, then you should have been issued a yellow book at the same time. For the yellow book you will need to go to the same office that a Thai would go to get their blue book or ID card and ask them what documents you need to bring. It will be a stack, but basically the same stack of documents you need to apply for citizenship. The yellow book may take a few months to get and it should only cost something around 100 baht (definitely less than 1000). It has been such a long time since went through that ordeal that I have forgotten the process. My name was on a yellow book in Bangkok for 1 day prior to applying at SB in Bangkok (I had been on a yellow book in our home province for almost 5 years prior to that). They don't care how long you have been on the registration in Bangkok, only that your registration is in Bangkok.

2 - I think this is only applicable for Permanent Residents 5 - Yes, you need to put your name on a Yellow Book in Bangkok first. If not, SB opposite Central World will tell you to talk to immigration in your home province. Don't waste your time with this. Move your registration, it will save you headaches later. it is ok if you and your wife are registered to different addresses. 6 - Yes, copy every page dating back to the first time you got a Non Immigrant-O Visa 10 - Tax office will print one out and certify it for you, plan to waste a couple of hours for this nonsense. 11 - If you don't have a work permit. Then STOP HERE. You cannot continue until you get a work permit, even if you are paying taxes in Thailand. If you are shareholder in the company then you will need to get a certified tax return for your company for the past year too. You will also need a letter of employment from your company stating your salary, position, and employment date 13 - See number 11. If your wife has a formal company, then a letter from her on the letterhead is acceptable. 17 - This one isn't required anymore. Don't worry about it 18 - Yes read the past few pages on this forum, there are a few people discussing this. It is required for the countries that have embassies that will sign the affidavit, otherwise some people seem to have success just taking a picture infant of their embassy Good Luck!

Two months ago I bought my first house in my name. I took all of my paperwork (nationality certificate, marriage certificate, house registration, ID card, and some extra stuff) but they only wanted to see my marriage certificate and ID card (of course). I was surprised that they didn't even hesitate in processing the registration in my name. Maybe it is because I spoke Thai with them, but the process was completely painless. I immediately went to the Khet and got my shiny new blue book with my name showing as owner of the house. Again no issues here, in and out in 30 minutes. Now my only remaining Thai bucket list is voting in Thailand (sadly it looks like I will miss this time around due to not being Thai for 5 years) and driving a Taxi in Thailand. I word for anyone just starting the process or thinking about starting the process. Go for It! It is so worth it (assuming you come from a country that allows dual nationality). I recommend you read through at least the last 50 pages of this forum, you will learn a lot from many really helpful people. Good luck!

I encourage you to take a look at pages around 190 to 210 of this forum. During that time there were a lot of us active giving details about the timeline for the process. Here is a link to my post:

I usually just hand them my boarding pass and they get the flight number they are looking for. They always write the flight number above the entry stamp. If they don't get the flight number, it causes them great frustration. For those that are worried about immigration knowing that you came from your previous nationality country, I have never been asked for previous boarding passes, so for instance if I flew from Frankfurt via Dubai, they never ask to see the Frankfurt to Dubai flight, only the Dubai to BKK flight. I now have 8 stamps in and out with my Thai passport with no entry stamps or visas to any other country in my Thai passport. I have never been asked why I don't have any visas in my Thai passport or why I don't have stamps from anywhere else.

I have flown in and out of the country 6 times since getting my Thai passport. Since I have an ABTC card I always go through the Fast Track lanes which means I get stamps in my passport. I don't have a single foreign stamp in my Thai Passport as I have always entered my destination country on my foreign passport, I only have Thai stamps which looks strange. It has never caused me a single problem. I always have to show both passports during check-in but from then on I only show the passport that I need at the time. In Thailand at immigration and again at the gate, I show my Thai passport. When I land in the foreign country I use my foreign passport. Last week, the Thai immigration officer even politely asked me how I got Thai citizenship as her friend wanted to go through the process. I would never consider specifically picking a route that allows me to travel through a country that allows visa-free entry using a Thai passport. The Thai authorities just don't care. If one day they decided to give dual citizens a hassle, they would have to deal with an uprising of half of the elites in this country who have purchased or acquired another citizenship as part of their "safety net". So my message to anyone stressing about this is Don't Worry.

So, funny thing. When I left Thailand last week with an 11 year old child and without her mother, the immigration officer pulled me aside and wanted to FaceTime my wife to confirm she had given me her consent to take our child out of Thailand. I'm glad that she didn't change her mind on the FaceTime call after dropping us off at the airport a few minutes earlier ????. When my wife flew with another child a few days later, they didn't ask for my wife to call me. So I guess foreigner-faced Thai guy with Luuk Krung kids is more suspicious then Thai mother with Luuk Krung kids. When I asked if I should have brought any documents with me other than my child's passport, he said I should have also brought their birth certificate. I thought the whole situation was a bit bizarre

Two weeks ago I went to the driver's license office to get an international drivers license. I hadn't bothered to get my license updated after getting Thai citizenship last year, so they couldn't issue me an international drivers license until I first changed my license to reflect my Thai citizenship. Fortunately this process only took about 30 minutes, but required a copy of my naturalization certificate and royal gazette paperwork. I needed two sets of copies one for my car drivers license and one for my motorcycle drivers license. I brought the originals just in case, but only copies were required. The license with my Thai details has the same expiration date as my original license, so I wasn't given an automatic extension. I should have taken care of this earlier, but I didn't. Fortunately they didn't give me any hassle at all. I think that I now no longer have any official documents from Thai authorities or accounts linked to my previous nationality. I am finally 100% Thai according to all documents that mean anything in Thailand ????

I agree with @Arkady. Bring all the documents just in case. However, my documents were never checked (not even my passport or any form of ID) after I finished the NIA interview all the way up until I was at the Khed getting my Blue Thai ID card. Not a single one of my documents was checked at DOPA/MOI interview, Oath Ceremony, or when I picked up my naturalization certificate. Throughout the entire time I maintained my work permit as is required. My documents like yellow book and Work Permit were only checked again when I was at the Khed getting my blue ID card. If I remember correctly, the Christian oath was quite generic, other than putting a hand on bible, the actual oath had nothing to do with God or Christian beliefs. The Buddhist oath is much more involved requiring you to kneel before a shrine with incense in your hands.

First time I traveled out of the country last year, I didn't have any issues on my Thai passport. I don't know if it is because I have and ABTC card which allows me to go through VIP immigration lanes?? I have never been asked for my foreign passport once since cancelling my Thai visa when I got my Thai ID. 2nd time I traveled out of the country, of course, also no problems.

It sounds like the process has changed a bit since I went through this part of the process 5 years ago. At that time interviewing with NIA was within 3 months after SB interview and fingerprinting. The NIA interview was only 30 minutes, and that was after a very detailed inspection of all of our vital documents. The NIA officer even found some errors that the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs made with our documents. I thought that was funny, and fortunately, the officer just moved on without making a big deal. The big wait will be after you finish your NIA interview. After NIA your application gets sent all around Bangkok for every department in the kingdom to affix their rubber stamp before it is finally forwarded onto MOI. You will not receive any automatic status updates from the time your NIA interview is finished until your MOI interview is scheduled. Many have reported that their SB officer did the decent thing and told them when their application was finally forwarded to MOI. In my case this was 5 or 6 months after my NIA interview that my documents were finally sent to the long queue at MOI (I had to ask my officer when it was finally sent). Right before my documents were sent to MOI, I did get a call back from my SB officer that I needed to bring some additional documents that the officer rejected the year prior saying that they weren't needed. I found out later that this mistake from my office ended up costing 8 months of processing time on my application. This is a lesson from the experience, that I think everyone here will echo, you just have to be patient with the process and give them whatever documents they ask for... at least in my case, they never asked for anything more than documents, and I never got the feeling that that would be required from my application to ultimately be successfully processed. There is no firm timeline but it seems that all applications within the past 7 years are completed between 2 years and 4 years after you apply. If you are famous, then you can possibly get everything finished within 1 year.

Fortunately my ABTC (APEC Business Traveler Card) card with my Thai passport gets me into most of the countries I need to go to including Australia, New Zealand and Mexico. Unfortunately it does not give a visa to the US and Canada. If you qualify through your company, this is definitely the easiest way to get a visa for most countries that touch the Pacific Ocean.

I have found that the humidity in Thailand is particularly rough on our documents. For the first 5 years I kept our marriage certificates, birth certificates, passports, etc. in plastic sleeves in a drawer in my house, when I noticed ink starting to soak through to the other side of the page and generally the paper degrading, I decided something needed to change. I bought one of those water-resistant, fire-resistant safes (3000 baht if I recall) and put one of those moisture absorbing canisters in the back of the safe (100 baht each). I have found out that the canister needs to be switched every 6 months or so as moisture is collected inside. Since making the change, my documents do not appear to have degraded a single day. I too considered laminating my documents, but I now prefer keeping them in individual plastic sheets in a humidity minimized safe, mostly because I know that the country of my previous nationality does not accept laminated documents and some Thai officials I have asked in passing have grunted their displeasure with laminated documents. Even the dust cover on my passport gets removed almost every time because I suppose immigration officers (of various countries) can only detect forgeries if they put their grubby paws on the actual cover of the passport. One of the benefits of getting Thai nationality is that I almost never have to crack open my safe for various documents anymore. I just have to wip out my blue ID card from my wallet.

This all depends on the country of your original citizenship. When you obtain Thai citizenship, the Special Branch will send a letter to your embassy saying that you have obtained Thai citizenship. If you are from a country that can't be bothered like the US, UK, Canada, Australia.... then I assume the letter goes in the waste bin. I have heard from my US friends that they actually have to pay 3000 dollars to renounce their citizenship, and if they formally say that they are doing it to avoid paying taxes, they will not be allowed to renounce their citizenship. For countries that don't care about dual nationality, you can just say that your intentions to renounce citizenship changed. However, if you are from China, Singapore, Germany, India, to name a few, you will be required to renounce your citizenship, based on their own laws. I doubt that the Thai authorities will ever require you to give up a second nationality because I have known some very powerful people in the government and Thai social structures that are dual nationals. Axing dual nationality will directly affect them too. Travel is not a problem at all. I have already flown in and out of the country multiple times with 2 passports, and immigration doesn't care if you have a visa to the country you are going to or not. If you are particularly worried, just go through the automatic immigration gates. But you will need to show your foreign passport at check-in if visa is required. GabbaGabbaHey is also correct based on what I have heard. In talking with some friends that work in their respective embassies if you enter into Thailand with your Thai passport (which you are legally required to do, if you are Thai) that you are no longer able to seek diplomatic assistance of any sort from your embassy. You can always renew your passport and take care of citizenship services, but if you get thrown in jail as a Thai, you are stuck. When Nato forces pulled out of Afghanistan, all of the foreign nationals that were left behind were dual citizens that were not on the embassy records because they had arrived in Afghanistan on their local Afghanistan passports. I assume this would be the case if there is ever a need for medical or emergency evacuations from Thailand for specific nationals. You are a Thai, so you are stuck here.

From what others have said, it sounds like it is not required for witnesses to visit SB. When I visited SB during my paperwork collection phase, they. said that I needed 2 witnesses but that they could "arrange" them for me. Avoiding the possible awkwardness if payment was required for these "arranged" witnesses, I opted to find my own 2 witnesses. I assumed that they would have to come to the office, so I brought them with me when I finalized my application, but I suppose it may not be required. They were interviewed for less than 5 minutes and then were allowed to leave. I suppose this is an indication that their presence was not even required.

I took my witnesses to the office on the day that I "finalized" my application, which was not the day that I was finger printed and interviewed with the big boss and then the big big boss. SB should be able to tell you when you need to bring your friends. Your wife will need to be with you during all interviews at SB, NIA (background check interview), and MOA (big group interview). I can't remember if she has to be there when you take the oath or not. After you have taken the oath she does not need to come with you to pick up your certification of citizenship, but that takes only 30 minutes after minimum 3 years after you have started the process. Basically, your wife will need to be with you the entire time whenever there is an official interview. In my case, I felt more comfortable with my wife there, too, so that I wouldn't be asked for a bribe when she was not there to protect me as a Thai. I should say now, that I doubt that I would have been asked for a bribe and the officers I interacted with were respectful and straightforward, but I suppose you never know what could happen. Best of luck in your application!

Check In - Thai Passport (and foreign passport if no visa in your Thai passport) Immigration - Thai Passport Only, in 10s of trips out of Thailand for my dual national relatives, I have never seen immigration want to see another passport ever. At the Gate - Depends on which passport the check in counter used to check you in. I recommend you using your Thai passport, but you can use either. If you give them the wrong one, the automatic scanner will beep requiring you to walk 1 meter to the people behind the computers who will scan your boarding pass and look at the passport you handed the gate agent, they will then promptly wave you through. My general policy is to only use my foreign passport when absolutely necessary (like at check in when a visa is required for the final destination), once you are out of Thailand you can flash which ever passport you want while in transit to your final destination. I have never seen agents at the boarding gates check for visas in your passport unless you are boarding a flight to the US (there may be others), so I typically just use whichever passport is handy from then on. When arriving at your destination immigration, use whichever passport is required to enter that country. On the way back, just reverse the process.