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Why is it named Immigration Bureau?


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18 hours ago, Number 6 said:

Why is it called Immigration when no one is effectively allowed to immigrate?

Not "no one" - but "very few."  Granted, 99.9% of what they do in "immigration" offices doesn't seem to involve actual "immigration," per-se - though the word is generally used world-wide to include various forms of alien permissions to stay in a country.

 

I think tightly limiting citizenship is good policy, to ensure the descendents of Thais inherit their own country.  Being overrun / outnumbered by foreigners granted citizenship, such that their grandchildren's futures will be dictated/decided by people who may not even have a token-respect for their lineage / culture (possibly disdain/hate for it) should never be allowed.

 

That said, it would be nice if longer-term expats with a clean-record of stay over years had a path to some form of PR - less difficult than the process for PR, currently.  As long as this does not change the rules regarding ownership of land (i.e. - nothing beyond a condo in a 51% Thai-owned building), it would not pose a threat to Thais, and would make life more relaxed for longer-term expats and their Thai families/friends.

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19 minutes ago, JackThompson said:

Not "no one" - but "very few."  Granted, 99.9% of what they do in "immigration" offices doesn't seem to involve actual "immigration," per-se - though the word is generally used world-wide to include various forms of alien permissions to stay in a country.

 

I think tightly limiting citizenship is good policy, to ensure the descendents of Thais inherit their own country.  Being overrun / outnumbered by foreigners granted citizenship, such that their grandchildren's futures will be dictated/decided by people who may not even have a token-respect for their lineage / culture (possibly disdain/hate for it) should never be allowed.

 

That said, it would be nice if longer-term expats with a clean-record of stay over years had a path to some form of PR - less difficult than the process for PR, currently.  As long as this does not change the rules regarding ownership of land (i.e. - nothing beyond a condo in a 51% Thai-owned building), it would not pose a threat to Thais, and would make life more relaxed for longer-term expats and their Thai families/friends.

Immigrant means someone who has moved to a country to live, there are thousands in Thailand.

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In Thai they call it "person entering the country", they probably chose "immigration" as translation because that's how it's called in many countries and most people will understand what it's about.

If you look up the definition of immigration: "the action of coming to live permanently in a foreign country"

So for example a retiree planning to spend the rest of his life in Thailand using a non-O visa is not an immgrant according to Thai law,  but still an immigrant according to the definition of the word itself.

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People, these days, tend to use the term "immigration" to refer to only those moving permanently to another country, but that is not the original meaning.

 

Wikipedia has a pretty good definition:

Quote

Immigration is the international movement of people into a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle or reside there, especially as permanent residents or naturalized citizens, or to take up employment as a migrant worker or temporarily as a foreign worker.

The monitoring of the movement of people in and out of the country, and of their status while here, is validly termed "immigration control".

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The answer is simple.

 

1. It is a poor translation from Thai, "The office inspecting foreigners entering the country". That sounds crap so :-

 

2. in true Thai style they take an impressive sounding English name for an institution and apply it. This sorts out a number of problems. Foreigners know what it purports to do. It sounds professional and competent. It piggybacks on the professionalism of immigration departments in other countries. There are many similar examples. Thais have a Parachute Regiment in which many of the soldiers never parachute. It has a Special Branch. It has an antitrust law. It has museums and public libraries! They all sound great but...... Remember face is everything.

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1 hour ago, Neeranam said:

Immigrant means someone who has moved to a country to live, there are thousands in Thailand.

Thousands - yes - built-up slowly over many years.  I would include those with PR and Citizenship in that category.  The rest of us live here with "year at a time" permission (at most) on "Non-Immigrant" Visas or Extensions. 

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Lots of different things going on here.

 

In Thai it is called สำนักงานตรวจคนเข้าเมือง. Litterally ‘the office for inspecting people entering the city’.

 

Immigration department is a pretty standard international translation for the job this department does.

 

Having read Thai visa for too long now, there are way too many people here who can’t bring themselves to be called ‘immigrants’, despite that they’ve upped stumps and moved here lock stock and barrel. The basic definition of an immigrant. 

 

They prefer to call themselves ‘expats’ as ‘immigrants’ is something they bestow on little brown people who have moved their home country.

 

They then blow on about how they can’t really be immigrants - snobbily telling you they are here on an ‘non-immigrant’ visa. Totally oblivious to the fact of course that that particular visa died after three months and now they are on an ‘extension of stay’ rather than a visa.

 

That the Thai immigration department keeps them on a short leash is one thing. Renewable extensions year on year are what the law defines. 

 

But there isn’t a country in the world which doesn’t keep non-citizens on some sort of leash when it comes to permissions to stay. So again Thailand is no different at that point. 

 

For long termers, if the goal posts have changed the authorities have grandfathered the old rules for them. So there is hardly an overly burdensome hurdle there. 

 

If you are a retiree, you get to chuck less than $30,000 in a bank account and stay for ever. Half if you are married to a local.

 

Sounds like a pretty darn good deal to me. 

 

As for staying on a permanent class of visa, ie PR, or even citizenship (if married to a thai spouse), i’d contend that’s the hurdles are pretty tiny. Essentially they add up to:

 

- Three Years in a decent job with the right paperwork to back it up. 

- A decent but hardly ludicrous  salary

- Speaking a bit of the local lingo at a conversational level.

 

Hardly earth shattering stuff here but people seem to have it in their minds that is is all but impossible.

 

It clearly isn’t, people with even a modicum of initiative about them can get it and plenty do. 

 

Unfortunately it all falls into the ‘too hard basket’, or most probably, they don’t see any value in it, at which point why are they complaining?

Edited by samran
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1 hour ago, samran said:

Lots of different things going on here.

 

In Thai it is called สำนักงานตรวจคนเข้าเมือง. Litterally ‘the office for inspecting people entering the city’.

 

Immigration department is a pretty standard international translation for the job this department does.

 

Having read Thai visa for too long now, there are way too many people here who can’t bring themselves to be called ‘immigrants’, despite that they’ve upped stumps and moved here lock stock and barrel. The basic definition of an immigrant. 

 

They prefer to call themselves ‘expats’ as ‘immigrants’ is something they bestow on little brown people who have moved their home country.

 

They then blow on about how they can’t really be immigrants - snobbily telling you they are here on an ‘non-immigrant’ visa. Totally oblivious to the fact of course that that particular visa died after three months and now they are on an ‘extension of stay’ rather than a visa.

 

That the Thai immigration department keeps them on a short leash is one thing. Renewable extensions year on year are what the law defines. 

 

But there isn’t a country in the world which doesn’t keep non-citizens on some sort of leash when it comes to permissions to stay. So again Thailand is no different at that point. 

 

For long termers, if the goal posts have changed the authorities have grandfathered the old rules for them. So there is hardly an overly burdensome hurdle there. 

 

If you are a retiree, you get to chuck less than $30,000 in a bank account and stay for ever. Half if you are married to a local.

 

Sounds like a pretty darn good deal to me. 

 

As for staying on a permanent class of visa, ie PR, or even citizenship (if married to a thai spouse), i’d contend that’s the hurdles are pretty tiny. Essentially they add up to:

 

- Three Years in a decent job with the right paperwork to back it up. 

- A decent but hardly ludicrous  salary

- Speaking a bit of the local lingo at a conversational level.

 

Hardly earth shattering stuff here but people seem to have it in their minds that is is all but impossible.

 

It clearly isn’t, people with even a modicum of initiative about them can get it and plenty do. 

 

Unfortunately it all falls into the ‘too hard basket’, or most probably, they don’t see any value in it, at which point why are they complaining?

You missed out the application fee, remind me how much.

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22 hours ago, Number 6 said:

Why is it called Immigration

you know the the answer. Be seeing you Number 6.

 

"We want information"

"You won't get it."

"By hook or by crook, we will."

 

"Everyone has a number, yours is number 6"

 

"I am not a number, I am a free man."

 

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2 hours ago, JackThompson said:

Thousands - yes - built-up slowly over many years.  I would include those with PR and Citizenship in that category.  The rest of us live here with "year at a time" permission (at most) on "Non-Immigrant" Visas or Extensions. 

We are long term visitors here on a short term extension of 1 year.

 

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53 minutes ago, overherebc said:

You missed out the application fee, remind me how much.

5000 odd baht for citizenship is the application fee. They’ll only take your money if you qualify. 

 

198k is the fee in successfully gaining PR. Half of that if you are married. 

 

Again, not huge in the scheme of things. 

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7 hours ago, samran said:

They prefer to call themselves ‘expats’ as ‘immigrants’ is something they bestow on little brown people who have moved their home country.

As if the physical characteristics of those who flooded your labor-market and drove your wages into poverty is the real issue, as the media owned by those banking extra profits from driving down wages try to convince us - to shame us into silence (and, sadly, quite effectively - similar in psychological-methods of silencing the opposition as were effective during the Chinese cultural revolution, Marxist revolution in Russia, etc).

 

Quote

They then blow on about how they can’t really be immigrants - snobbily telling you they are here on an ‘non-immigrant’ visa. Totally oblivious to the fact of course that that particular visa died after three months and now they are on an ‘extension of stay’ rather than a visa.

The "extension of stay" is "non-immigrant" as well. 

 

7 hours ago, samran said:

If you are a retiree, you get to chuck less than $30,000 in a bank account and stay for ever. Half if you are married to a local.

At some offices, they don't make it that easy - lots of "extra rules" that aren't published, and change every year - plus abuse of your Thai-wife - unless you pay them off via an agent to "make the problems go away."

 

Not to be misunderstood, I'd Prefer to Be An Immigrant here, if it didn't mean going back to 9-5 for years - taking a job from a Thai (as was done to me in my passport-country) to accomplish that goal.

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