How can I open a Thai bank account to deposit 800k before getting a visa, or should I get the visa first?

if you pay in cash make sure you get receipts 😊

@Lucia ********

@Lucia ********

I ended up hiring an agent It cost $10,000 baht and everything was done within 30 minutes. applying from inside the country of Thailand worked better for me, I did not check Malaysia. Good luck!

@Johan *****************

technically you have income of 800k, which cant be treated as a gift, and unless it has supporting documentation for a structured loan, term, interest rate etc cant be treated as a loan. You have no tax credits from your home country for it so the 800k is assesable income and subject to tax. The first time maybe ok based on your tax residency, but the second year and subsequent years you are probably a tax resident.

@Tony *******

240k in tax why?

Dieter Kuehn they often find out the hard way, everyone thought the education wheeze was great until the authorities clamped down….better to control your own destiny - agents fuel corruption, which never lasts….

@Dieter ******

Yes I know there’s always people willing to help you with something at a real cost at 1900 baht for 20 to 40K baht with getting a non legitimate stay in Thailand. One day it might be cracked down be the government and you’ll need to leave.

@Jan *****************

if you say so, you should inform the hundreds of Falangs in Pattsya using this method for many, many years without any of the mentioned problems ever occured 🤣🤣🤣

@Dieter ******

If you decide to jump on the agent train to bypass the formal requirements for stay in Thailand by letting an agent “borrow” you the money, you’ll also get stuck with an agent for all your future extensions. So If you use an agent to bypass the money in the bank requirement, next year when you go to apply for an extension you'll be denied. You must supply 12 months of bank statements to prove you continued to the meet the requirements last year which is that you must keep the 800,000 baht in the bank for 3 months after you received your extension, and it cannot drop below 400,000 the rest of the year. You'll need the agent to bypass these requirements again for next year. Or if your agent disappeared for a few days and returned with stamps from a completely different province hundreds of km away, you'll also have to use an agent again next time because everyone knows how you got your extension, as those stamps come from provinces known for this and are completely obvious to immigration.