When can I apply for a one-year extension on my Non O 90-Day visa and what documents do I need?

We are now talking about the most common and persisting misunderstandings regarding the applications for the “retirement visa” and the subsequent “one-year extension of the stay permit based on retirement”

The best way to reach your goals is to show up in Thailand on a “90-days single entry Non-Imm-O Retirement/over 50 years visa” you have applied for in your home country in the E-Visa online system of the Thai embassy or consulate.

Normally, you can fly on a one-way ticket on this visa, as it is meant to get changed into a longterm permit. Email your airline to be rest assured that they follow this guideline.

On this visaclass, you will get stamped in on a 90-days stay permit upon entering Thailand. This visa enables you to get a Thai bank account opened in your name, which you will need for the first year.

After having entered Thailand, you need to get registered in your accommodation per TM30 within 24 hours of arrival in the premises. If you have booked a hotel stay, the hotel will automatically register you per TM30 in the System. If you rent or live in a friend’s accommodation, the landlord or the friend has to register you.

Right after you got properly registered, you can get a “certificate of residency” from Immigration and with this and your passport, you can open a Thai bank account.

Within this 90-days stay permit period, you have plenty of time to arrange for the application to the “1-year extended stay permit based on retirement” (which people wrongly refer to as a “retirement visa”) Actually, this thing is not a visa. It is an extended stay permit

In order to apply for the “90-days single entry Non-Imm-O retirement visa” through the online E-visa system at the Royal Thai Embassy of your home country (or also in any other country using the e-visa system) you can use the proof of income of a monthly minimum of equivalent of 65,000 THB, by using your original pension statements or other income documentation.

Or you use a deposit of a minimum of 800,000 THB or the equivalent in your home country currency, or on your home bank account, or on a Thai bank, or just anywhere in the World – as long as the account is in your sole name. Some embassies will require 3 months of account statements over this deposit. You need to check the website of the embassy you will use for what their requirement is.

However, for the application inside Thailand for the “1-year extension of the stay permit” out of the 90-days Non-Imm-O retirement visa, if you are a citizen of a country, whose embassy in Thailand does not issue the “income affidavit” any more

(which are the embassies of the USA, UK and Australia, Norway and Canada - AFAIK)

you would need proof by a “12 months bank statement”, showing that for the past 12 months, you have been transferring from abroad to your Thai bank account a minimum of 65,000 THB, consecutively month for month

If your embassy still issues a legalized affidavit of income, you can use this method for the financial proof, as long as you can show a monthly income or pension of a minimum of 65,000 THB

For above mentioned citizens, in the first year there is no other way around than depositing a minimum of 800,000 THB in your Thai bank account and use this deposit for the financial proof. For the application to the “one year extension of stay permit based on being over 50/retired” you need to show a minimum of 800,000 THB in your account and the funds must have been sat there for a minimum of 2 months, and you got the “bank letter of guarantee” that confirms this.

The alternative would be, if you don’t have that kind of money or are not willing to deposit 800,000 THB in your Thai Bank account, paying an agent a hefty sum (mostly in the range of 32-40,000 THB) to “arrange” the requirements

The downside is, you will get stuck with the agent for a while. You will need an agent to fix your 800k issue. You will be trapped in the agent’s hamster wheel.

To qualify you will need the 800k fronted by the agent the first year and simultaneously deposit 65k per month for 12 months without fail, to qualify the 2nd year for income method. Yet this is not enough to enable you to escape the hamster wheel.

If you use an agent, you will not qualify for the 2nd year as you did not have the money in the first year . . . . So you will need the agent grease the palms again and again.

NOTE: It is income method OR deposit method.

And there is a third method, called the “combination method”:

A combination, a mix of income and deposit.

Some immigrations don’t allow the combination method in the first year. And some Immigration want the deposit part to exceed 400,000 THB. The combination method means that the sum of the deposit AND the monthly income exceeds 800,000 THB in one year.

But let’s continue with the “normal method” (visa issued in your home country, followed by the application to the Extension inside Thailand):

On the day of application to the 1-year extension, the 800,000 THB must have “seasoned” in your account for two months, and this has to be proven with the “bank letter of guarantee” (rab roong thanakan).

Immigration will only service you if you are properly registered in your accommodation by the TM30.

Every landlord or hotel needs to register you within 24 hours of your arrival in the premises. While hotels do this automatically online, many landlords are not aware of this or haven’t registered their house or rooms in the system. It is your responsibility to ensure that you get properly TM30 registered.

After been issued the “1-year Extension of Stay”, the 800,000 THB need to remain in the account for 3 more months. After these 3 months, the deposit shall never go under 400,000 THB. And before your application for the next “1-year Extension of Stay”, a minimum of 800,000 THB must have seasoned in the account for two months, again

When you get issued the “1-year extension of stay”, you should always buy a re-entry permit for it.

A re-entry permit will keep your 1-year stay permit alive in case you exit Thailand before the expiry of the 1-year stay permit.

A single re-entry permit is 1000 THB on Immigration. A multi re-entry is 3800 THB.

With a multi re-entry permit, you can exit and re-enter as many times as you wish during the whole 1-year stay permit period.