What was the experience of a successful tourist visa run at the Thai Embassy in Vientiane?

Successful Visa Run Thai Embassy Vientiane last week (Tourist Visa).

I made my appointment 5 weeks earlier than the day I planned to apply for my visa. I think there are 100 appointments per day. When I booked my appointment there were 96 appointments left and I was given queue number 5

The embassy is deserted these days, the whole courtyard was empty and all of the benches empty also. When I was there I saw at most 20 people applying for visas. From entering the embassy gates to leaving it took less than 15 minutes to lodge the application.

There are still a few touts, fixers and chancers outside the gates trying to trick people into paying for the free visa application form, offering to get people who have turned up without an appointment, an appointment, and offering to fix other problems re lack of meeting the requirements. There were a handful of tuk tuk drivers also (maybe 5) in comparison to the hordes that used to wait around outside the embassy.

There is no longer a photocopying service inside the embassy. There is a guy sitting outside the Korean Restaurant to the right of the embassy gates who has a printer, and will do photocopies and who can very slowly print from email. He will accept payment in baht as well as Kip.

Vientiane likewise was very quiet in the tourist precinct, near the river, eerily so in the daytime with silent streets and little traffic

Collection of passport/visa (2 working days later) took less than 5 minutes, only about half a dozen people at the embassy to get their passports back and when I collected mine at 1.45pm, I could see only 5 more to be collected.

I had anticipated the embassy staff to be very stringent with their acceptance of proofs of finances and onward travel, given what they ask for now, however that wasn't my experience. I submitted accommodation verification for one week immediately after re-entry to Thailand, a 3 month copy of my bank account/ transactions, which didn't include the day I submitted the statement or the two previous days, a copy of a bus ticket from Udon Thani to Bangkok for the date I planned to cross the border and the data page of my passport.

There are no baguette sellers outside the embassy anymore and no mini bus /shuttle operations running people to the Friendship Bridge

Crossing over the border was straightforward, the immigration officer seemed pleased that I had an actual visa. I saw him giving another foreigner a hard time for making repeated re-enteries. I don't have any Covid visas or a recent history of back to back tourist visas. He asked only about the full address of my booked accommodation (I had the financial proof in cash and a flight out of Thailand but wasn't asked to show this). Thai immigration at Nong Khai insisted that everyone fill out an arrival/departure card (TM6) like in the past

Remember to check not only Lao public holidays, religious holidays and Lao office holidays when booking your appointment. Don't make a rookie mistake like me, and forget to also check for Thai public holidays to avoid being stranded for days in Vientiane without your passport!