Sometimes immigration tries to send the applicant back to the visa agency.
Your encounter is a common situation if registered in a different province from where you are actually living.
While you may not have been granted an extension that time, your visa also remained valid as you left immigration.
We try to support expats as much as we can, and we regularly help them transition away from agency services if they wish to apply on their own in the future.
Everyone's situation is different, and for some doing it on their own is worth it in many ways. But for others it may not be worth it at all depending on their time, and circumstances.
Well you are advising people not to use our services, and telling people that it will haunt them forever.
But as you mentioned you never used our services.
Also your case would be considered an emergency case, and our team always handles these cases with care.
The main reason you were declined is because you did not file a TM30 in Bangkok, and you were registered in Chonburi or another province. In the future you can avoid this issue by simply applying in the same province your last extension was issued in, or filing a TM30 for the correct province.
LTR is obtainable with, or without an agency. But many applicants also choose our LTR services as we have successfully handled over 100 LTR cases, and only accept cases if we are confident we can obtain your visa successfully, and within a reasonable timeframe.
If you use a visa agent to support your case you can still apply without an agency as long as you file your TM30, and can support your application on your own.
We are supporters of DIY applications as well (after all we manage this group).