My trip to Jomtien Immigration

[Jingthing]

2 minutes ago, marcusarelus said:

The mission of the United States Embassy is to advance the interests of the United States, and to serve and protect U.S. citizens in Thailand.

Yes, and if the U.S. embassies in Colombia and Peru can "officialize" U.S. citizens government pension benefits letters for use at their local immigration offices, there is no logical reason whatsoever that the U.S. embassy in Thailand can't provide that exact same service. They can. But they won't. 

[SammyT]

6 hours ago, a977 said:

So there you have it folks straight from the horses asses mouth At Jomtien . When is someone going to explain to these cretins the difference between what the police order states and what a Memorandum is PLEASE 

 

Given those two sentences, I'm 100% sure you probably didn't pass the attitude test on the day which may have allowed them to offer you some discretion as well... Keep rolling with your western superiority complex and I'm sure life will only get easier for you here.

[Jingthing]

Just now, SammyT said:

 

Given those two sentences, I'm 100% sure you probably didn't pass the attitude test on the day which may have allowed them to offer you some discretion as well... Keep rolling with your western superiority complex and I'm sure life will only get easier for you here.

Clearly so, but even the most respectably presented and wai-ing/deferring applicant is still going to have their application rejected if they don't meet their technical rules. 

[SammyT]

1 hour ago, possum1931 said:

3 hours ago, Puchaiyank said:

The 800k baht has been a requirement for retirement visas for years...the embassy income letters have been exposed as a farce...put the money in a Thai bank and move on...or just move.

Another member of "if you don't like it go home" brigade.

 

Nope, more likely a member of the "common sense" brigade. Or the brigade who respect the right of the Thai government to make a rule and enforce it. 

 

I'm picking you're a member of the "I'm a rich farang and should be able to do what I like" brigade?

[luckyluke]

19 minutes ago, ExpatDraco said:

While most Belgians have to do with a lot less pension. Consider yourself lucky Luke.

The basis principe in Belgium is, the more  you earn, the more you are deducted by the government : taxes, contributions, social security....

and how higher your pension is.

I am married, so my pension is a family pension.

 

By the way, I salute you Lord Draco.

[Thailand]

3 hours ago, PatOngo said:

IMHO if someone cannot afford to deposit 800,00 baht in an account then they are not ready for retirement!

Perhaps they should all go home,assuming they can afford to?

[JackThompson]

4 hours ago, Puchaiyank said:

The 800k baht has been a requirement for retirement visas for years...the embassy income letters have been exposed as a farce...put the money in a Thai bank and move on...or just move.

Please explain how, exactly, they were "exposed as a farce"?  All I have seen is, "My friend at the bar told me he lied..." sort of claims. 

 

A felony-charge is nothing to sneeze at (USA and AU), and TI could have referred anyone lying for prosecution if they had any evidence of fraud - not to mention local charges for lying to RTP by presenting a fraudulent document.

 

6 hours ago, glegolo said:

Bull.. there were absolutely no "demands".. That is just an after-construction from your embassies side,, in order to not look like <deleted> when stopping issuing these income-letters... Specially when the whole rest of the would is doing them......

 

glegolo

I do not see why it can not be a combination effort.  TI wanted to stop the embassy letters cutting into their agent-revenue, so brought this up at the May meeting.  Some nations wanted to "shift" some of their expats to other countries, so played it up. 

 

The UK offers pension-increases, if you move to the PI - but not if you stay here; think about why that is?  Similarly, the PI has more than doubled the length of time one can stay in-country before doing an out/in run - to 3 years. 

 

In most world-events I have studied, there is no "good team" to be found - though sometimes a "less bad" or "much less bad" team.  In this case - embassies/depts-of-state vs immigration - it could be about equally bad.  One grabbed on arm, and one grabbed the other, and under-the-bus we went.

[ExpatDraco]

The basis principe in Belgium is, the more  you earn, the more you are deducted by the government : taxes, contributions, social security....
and how higher your pension is.
I am married, so my pension is a family pension.
 
By the way, I salute you Lord Draco.

;-)

True, the more you earn the more taxes you pay... but pensions are capped, so at one point you pay more and more taxes but don't receive a higher pension. :(

[NoshowJones]

39 minutes ago, SammyT said:

 

Nope, more likely a member of the "common sense" brigade. Or the brigade who respect the right of the Thai government to make a rule and enforce it. 

 

I'm picking you're a member of the "I'm a rich farang and should be able to do what I like" brigade?

Thai government enforcing rules  need a brown enveIope for that.???? I wish I was a rich Farang???? and yes, I will do what I like if I think I will get away with it, and anything I do is not to the detriment of ordinary people.

Stick to everyones rules and you may as well just stay in your bed.

[Tanoshi]

1 hour ago, Jingthing said:

I would suggest that expats not expect those to be OK, and instead plan for an 800K bank account seasoned application where embassy letter was never needed.

You keep repeating that rhetoric throughout your posts and beginning to sound like an IO.

 

Repeated telling an 80 year old married expat, with assets of several thousand baht invested in Thailand, but living on a pension of 50-60K per month, to put the 400K in the bank doesn't help their situation.

Even f they tightened their belts, how long would it take to save 400K?

[Jingthing]

16 minutes ago, Tanoshi said:

You keep repeating that rhetoric throughout your posts and beginning to sound like an IO.

 

Repeated telling an 80 year old married expat, with assets of several thousand baht invested in Thailand, but living on a pension of 50-60K per month, to put the 400K in the bank doesn't help their situation.

Even f they tightened their belts, how long would it take to save 400K?

800K is for the RETIREMENT bank account method. 
Less for marriage.

Combo method is for RETIREMENT. Never has been an option for marriage.

You are making up stories about what I am "telling" anyone, married or otherwise.

Please desist with the personalized, blatantly distorted garbage.

It doesn't help anyone. 

 

To add, perhaps not every time, but when I post about suggesting that the 800K bank account method seasoned is a sure thing and people should consider that during this time of uncertainty for income (and combo) based applications when you can't get an income letter, I typically say IF YOU CAN. Dude, I have never and would never suggest everybody can. Of course, not everyone can. 

At this point in time, there is nobody on this forum or outside this forum that can say definitely that if you present an income based application (including combo) WITHOUT EMBASSY LETTER based on the currently published rules that there is a very high assurance of acceptance.

 

Maybe soon. Maybe later this year. Maybe next year. But not now. 

 

Pretty much anyone can say that there is a high level of acceptance predictability about seasoned bank based applications and also income (including combo) applications with an embassy letter (following the rules of course). 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 25, 2019 by Jingthing

[Spidey]

2 hours ago, divali said:

For the embassies that still provide the affidavit, nothing has changed!

Nothing has changed for any of the embassies. For those that had the common sense to obtain an embassy letter before the deadline, those letters will still be acceptable until mid June.

 

Don't blame the embassies or TI for your spectacular lack of foresight.

[Spidey]

3 hours ago, stanleycoin said:

I doubt they will reduce staffing level.

More like reduce,  there work load.

So more time to Toss it off, or dream up more ways to stuff over those traitor Ex-pats.  

At the British Embassy, the income letters were processed entirely by Thai ancillary staff. My last income letter was even signed by a Thai.

[Spidey]

2 hours ago, Tanoshi said:

To 'verify' the income, as per Immigrations choice of word, would mean not accepting the original documents presented as being genuine, but in checking with the various organisation who issued the letters, that the letter and it's contents were actually genuine.

(The documents have been 'verified' as being genuine and original).

Data protection laws prevent this without your written permission.

There is zero evidence that this was said in the meeting between TI and the embassies, last May.

 

They asked for a greater level of verification from some embassies. Which embassies that was directed at and what level of verification they were asking for, we'll probably never know.

 

However, there's some indication of what was said in the fact that several embassies, who preform a similar level of verification to the British Embassy, saw no reason to change their method of verification or cease issuing their income letters.

[Spidey]

1 hour ago, JackThompson said:

A felony-charge is nothing to sneeze at (USA and AU), and TI could have referred anyone lying for prosecution if they had any evidence of fraud - not to mention local charges for lying to RTP by presenting a fraudulent document.

And in all the years of those embassies issuing affidavits, not one person was prosecuted for it, although I've no doubt a number of their citizens gilded the lily when making their declarations.

[Tanoshi]

1 hour ago, alex8912 said:

If all you have is a measly pension after 30 or 40 years of work it means you were completely unprepared for your end of life.

Nonsense, even those who thought they planned well 50 years ago are now suffering due to events/situations/circumstances beyond their control, such as global market crashes.

Many pension plans had a restriction on investments.

The projected forecast for many final salaries never materialised at maturity.

UK pensioners have their government pensions frozen living in Thailand.

 

You were obviously never married then divorced and had the vultures pick at your bones.

[Tanoshi]

28 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

At this point in time, there is nobody on this forum or outside this forum that can say definitely that if you present an income based application (including combo) WITHOUT EMBASSY LETTER based on the currently published rules that there is a very high assurance of acceptance.

Partly correct, 'no one on this forum'.

Incorrect 'outside this forum'.

 

Marriage extension, 12 months bank statements and letter from bank, accepted by local IO on 15/1, awaiting approval.

Note, neither the statements, nor the letter confirmed deposits from overseas (Kasikorn).

IO (Superintendent) stated they weren't concerned where the deposits came from.

[Jingthing]

8 minutes ago, Tanoshi said:

Partly correct, 'no one on this forum'.

Incorrect 'outside this forum'.

 

Marriage extension, 12 months bank statements and letter from bank, accepted by local IO on 15/1, awaiting approval.

Note, neither the statements, nor the letter confirmed deposits from overseas (Kasikorn).

IO (Superintendent) stated they weren't concerned where the deposits came from.

 

I don't see how even the big boss of all Thai immigration knows how income based applications (including combo) without embassy letters are actually in real life going to be enforced upon at all the immigration offices.

At this EARLY TIME with this new situation. 

Some high level insiders would presumably know their intentions (though on combo method without embassy letters even that is very questionable) but this is all so new, I stand by the gist of what I meant. There is nobody anywhere that can give you strong assurances (AT THIS TIME) about acceptance at all offices of income (and combo) based applications without embassy letters.

 

OK, I reread your post. You say you're having success. That's one case. Great! You do realize I was talking in GENERAL right?!? Individual cases of success or failure at a specific office are not enough to give people IN GENERAL confidence about this new situation (income including combo applications without embassy letter). 

Edited January 25, 2019 by Jingthing

[JackThompson]

4 hours ago, PatOngo said:

IMHO if someone cannot afford to deposit 800,00 baht in an account then they are not ready for retirement!

IMHO, anyone who believes this sort of thing should be put in jail and forced to do hard-labor until they get some humility for those who had a harder life, yet certainly deserve some better times at the end. 

 

Ideally, this would be accomplished with the use of a time-machine - transporting the offender to a Chinese re-education camp of 1950s vintage.  They were pretty good at teaching humility (see the film "The Last Emperor") - even though those running that system were (still are) pampered-ass hypocrites, who merely usurped the place of the former elite, under a new banner of lies.

 

Good thing neither of us gets to make the rules ????

 

But seriously, if you mean "doesn't have 800K worth of assets" that is one thing.  But "has 800K to spare, which they can put in a foreign-country bank-account - that is something else entirely.

 

3 hours ago, alex8912 said:

So how much should someone retired have in the bank according to you? 

...

How much do you think people need?  

It is not for me to say how much "spare money to put into a foreign-country bank account" a person should have, before beginning to enjoy their lives.

 

3 hours ago, alex8912 said:

So many emergent things  could arise after 60 and even more after 70.

Better not ever retire then - just work and hate every dang-day - dreading the next work-week - until you die - since you can never have enough to cover every possibility. 

 

Quote

800k is a bargain

A bargain for someone with many times that in investments - perhaps.  But, you are missing the point.  The rules invited people to come here and retire if they had 65K in total gross income.  People made plans based on that - bought condos, cars, etc - and set up a life here. 

 

But now, TI and the embassies have conspired to deny that promise.  In the case of our State-Depts, to rip us up by the roots and re-plant us somewhere elsewhere they find us "more useful."  And in the case of TI, to extort us via agents.

 

Quote

and I think it will go higher soon IMHO. 

When the greed-addict tolerance of those injecting agent-money adjusts to the latest increase from this letter-change, an increase quite possible, in order to increase the dosage some more.  That's how it is with addictions - whatever it is, it is never enough - until it becomes toxic, and they bring the whole thing down on their own heads - which will happen, eventually.

 

2 hours ago, alex8912 said:

It’s not nonsense many here have poor or no health insurance and require expensive care that baht in the bank could pay for.

2 hours ago, alex8912 said:

don’t you think hospitals here see old patients on a weekly or maybe even daily time line that can’t afford an operation they need or worse had?

 

2 hours ago, alex8912 said:

The police find old people who have fell down or slipped and broke some bone after being found by them a day or two later and can’t afford a hospital.

Sounds like a good anti-farang piece of propaganda for the nightly news - to help cover for our extortion by agents.  If true (probably happened somewhere, at least once), and if they used an income-letter with fake info, they should be referred for prosecution, if not also prosecuted here. 

 

There is no "foreigner health-welfare" service here.  If a foreigner cannot pay for their care, they won't get much if any here, and will be quickly sent home.  And as I have posted elsewhere, if this is really a problem, and they wanted to solve it, a simple charge/mo for every foreigner - covering the cost of any of these rare "stabilize and send home" cases - would be very inexpensive per-person/mo.  Young tourists in moto or jetski accidents could require intensive-care to save, but would also cover the rare old-codger with a broken-leg - even including their air-fare home.

 

Also, if this were a real / widespread problem, step one would be shutting down the elite visa, since it allows extended-stays without annual verification of finances of any sort.  Next, reinstate the income-letters - which were a better indicator of income that sending money in circles - and start referring letter-fakers for prosecution.  And most importantly, run sting-operations on agents and their IO buddies, until that entire network of corruption-money is rooted-out from the bottom-up, and all "extra requirement" tricks, used to force honest-applicants to agents, are ended.
 

Quote

If all you have is a measly pension after 30 or 40 years of work it means you were completely unprepared for your end of life.

Or foreigners were brought in to take your job and/or drive down your wages, or your job was shipped to China, or you had a medical-problem that wiped you out (or two), or your real-estate was driven under water in 2008 (due to the action of criminal banksters who never went to jail), or ... etc, etc. 

 

Of course, none of that is Thailand's problem.  But the rule here was 65K Baht/yr in total income or combo-method reaching 800K/yr, so anyone with that should not have their life here destroyed.

 

2 hours ago, alex8912 said:

Who cares if you get by on 30k the average person spends way more than that.

No, they don't - not in Thailand - not even close to that.  Some folks I met, working in the bigger hotels (where the Chinese tour-buses go), earned as little as 8K or 9K a month for 12-hour days 6 days/wk - worked like dogs, too - "faster faster" to reduce staff to the bare-minimum.  Then, complain the Thais weren't good enough, and hire even more desperate foreign-workers who would accept even less.

 

The smaller guesthouses serving Westerners (being driven out of business by immigration) tended to pay about 13K/mo for a lighter workload.  Wait-staff at restaurants - similar - much better where good-tipping Westerners eat - barely-survive wages where the tour-buses stop.

 

And all of these - even worst-cases - are making MORE than many not working in tourism.  A recent guest / relative came home for new-year; she works "industrial" in Bangkok, is paid even less than Chinese-tourist serving wages, and lives in what amounts to a huge dorm, in order to survive and send anything home.

 

Each one of us - even those spending only 30K, is boosting many Thai livelihoods to well above what they could otherwise earn.  Throwing us out is directly-betraying their own citizens; they know this full well - and they just don't care.

 

Quote

You just don’t see the whole picture and seem to live in your own me me me bubble.

??

 

Quote

Soon it will be over 800k required. Just wait or better yet SAVE! 

Covered above.  I never underestimate the harm greed could do - so you could be right. 

 

As to "saving" - always a good idea.  That is certainly better done while living here, than in our passport-countries, where overhead-expenses are much higher. 

 

The best plan would be to save money in accounts over there, while spending less on overhead while living over here.  In fact, many do exactly this, but the "show foreign transfers" new-rule is a major impediment to those savings plans.

Edited January 25, 2019 by JackThompson

[JackThompson]

1 hour ago, divali said:

Nobody seems to give the correct answer here! Everybody seems to forget one thing: If you want to use the combined method, you still will need from the embassy an affidavit confirming the part that you use as income part. If your embassy does not provide that anymore, of course you cannot use that method anymore,

1 hour ago, Jingthing said:

Ubonjoe has been saying that the combo method without embassy letter is still valid but suggests that immigration is working out the mechanics and communications about that.

This directly contradicts what the US Consul stated in his interview on the radio.  Also, all the changes provide is a new way to show income.  They would need to explicitly specify that the new way of proving income did not apply to the combination method, to take that method away. 

This appears to be more local-office agent-revenue maximizing at work.  When/if busted on it by higher-ups, they will claim they didn't understand - when they darn well did know exactly what they were doing.
 

1 hour ago, noise said:

If they issue an "validated"  income statement that is later proven to be a false declaration on the part of the retiree, their veracity in future political discussion would be suspect.

No.  And even if this were the case, they could lock the retiree in prison for lying, to satisfy any Thai interest in retribution and/or "setting an example."

[Jingthing]

Last time I checked some U.S. official on the radio doesn't determine enforcement policies at Thai immigration offices. The proof is in the actual enforcement. As this is all so early and many people have embassy letters from last year still valid for six months, it is way way too early to make final conclusions about actual enforcement expectations on income (and especially combo) applications without embassy letters. I'm saying be patient. We'll eventually know with more certainty. But if you can swing it and you want to avoid uncertainty, you should consider preparing an 800K seasoned bank method application for next time if you were planning an income (including combo) application this year and you won't have a valid embassy letter from last year.

[wgdanson]

4 hours ago, Spidey said:

Did anyone ask them to? Evidence? Many embassies continue to offer embassy letters using the same verification process as the British Embassy.

 

I haqve seen not one shred of evidence that anyone committed fraud when obtaining their income letters from the British Embassy.

Do you want to see mine?   LOL

[JackThompson]

 

4 hours ago, marcusarelus said:

Wasn't it the British embassy that first pretended that Thai Immigration wanted something new and they could not provide it and the US and Aussies just jumped on board to cut down on work load?   

The BE was scaling back, but not the USA, who was making a killing off those letters.  No idea on the AU's angle - no interviews for FOI results, yet.

 

4 hours ago, Orton Rd said:

Everyone was willing, the problem is many documents were fraudulent showing income people did not truly have.

I have yet to see evidence of "many documents were fraudulent" and "income people did not truly have."  Must be a few - but some "big problem" is not evident.

 

4 hours ago, Spidey said:

Evidence? Many embassies continue to offer embassy letters using the same verification process as the British Embassy.

France still uses Stat-Docs - yes?  No paperwork required?  Someone posted this elsewhere - but perhaps not.

[wgdanson]

4 hours ago, KCPhuket said:

Wondering what type of account holding the 800,000 will qualify?

Savings?

Fixed?

Fund?

Thanks

As long as it is Instant Access, when Immigration is open I may add. So a Foreign Currency Account would qualify as long as you can get online or to the bank to do the exchange  transfer.

[wgdanson]

4 hours ago, possum1931 said:

"Jst different rules applied on different Imm.officies". That has been the case as long as I can remember, and not just on this occasion.

See my post IMMIGRATION SUCCESS.

[Lovethailandelite]

Just now, wgdanson said:

See my post IMMIGRATION SUCCESS.

I really wouldn't be relying on what somebody told you will be acceptable....for next December.

[JackThompson]

2 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Last time I checked some U.S. official on the radio doesn't determine enforcement policies at Thai immigration offices.

Correct, of course.  And there was that blather about "teaching immigration about foreign docs" before, which evidently went nowhere. 

 

But, the new-rules should not have made any change to the combo-method.  The risk comes down to corruption - which is widespread - and why I do think your approach is a prudent one.  Some offices will be looking for any opening to not do the right thing.

[wgdanson]

1 minute ago, Lovethailandelite said:

I really wouldn't be relying on what somebody told you will be acceptable....for next December.

True, someone told me a man in red came down the chimney in December with presents. My Mrs was REALLY p**sed of when he didn't, just as I shall be if Mr IO's information gets changed.

[Chongalulu]

4 hours ago, PatOngo said:

IMHO if someone cannot afford to deposit 800,00 baht in an account then they are not ready for retirement!

If you’re economically literate you would not want 800k sitting in a zero/low interest Thai bank account rather than invested in a medium generating income/growth.

[Tanoshi]

11 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

I don't see how even the big boss of all Thai immigration knows how income based applications (including combo) without embassy letters are actually in real life going to be enforced upon at all the immigration offices.

At this EARLY TIME with this new situation. 

Read sections 2.18, Procedures (2) and 2.22, Procedures (1) of the new amendment.

They even give an example if the extension application is less than 1 year since the amendment was issued.

It specifically details income deposits in a Thai bank and certified letter.

 

The reference to income from an Embassy letter is detailed separately in (3) and (2) respectively.

 

The one reported case of a combo application was rejected because by the OP's own admission he hadn't deposited 65K per month, each and every month over the 3 month period.