@Natalia *******

It will depend on the province.

Plenty of travelers have reported trouble obtaining a 60 day covid extension directly on top of a visa exempt entry / tourist visa, and are pushed to first apply for a 30 day extension they should be obtaining.

Your experience confirms that it is possible to apply on your own, but the general consensus at the moment is that not currently the norm.

@Natalia *******

Thank you for sharing your experience.

What also would be helpful for the poster would be the date when you applied for the extension, as some offices change their process / policies.

@Miguel ************

What you are trying to do is possible through the standard route of applying on your own its just enforced differently depending on the office, history, and officer.

There are plenty of people who have obtained a covid extension directly on top of their tourist visa / exempt entry in this group.

We assume your intention of doing this is to prolong your stay as you fear the covid extensions may not exist past August 24th. Under normal circumstances you should be applying for the 30 day extension, and the officer may feel that you are abusing the covid extension, as you still can obtain the 30 day extension. But another officier may not mind, and still allow you to obtain the covid extension as you technically may still qualify for it.

This is not Thailand specific, and there are many countries which have processes where an officer can use their own discretionary powers to determine what should be done. You may get denied the first attempt, and then approved the next attempt as your situation can fall in-between the lines.

We honestly do not believe that these 60 day covid extensions will even be possible later this year, as they have already reduced the deadline extension term to only 1 month. It was supposed to be extended until September but it was only extended until August. We interpret this as a tapering off of these types of extensions. Because of this you may be better off by applying for a Tourist Visa before your next arrival (you may use the evisa system to do this).

@Miguel ************

"bypass" would be the wrong word as we just ensure that the extension will happen as requested. You can attempt to do this on your own as well, but a successful outcome will depend on multiple factors.

You can try asking in this group to find out which specific provinces are handling the extensions how you prefer, but keep in mind this may require traveling to another province if you are in a unfavorable province.

@Frank-Steven **********

You can obtain a covid extension extension on your own without an under-consideration stamp, but it may depend on which immigration office you apply at as well as your history, and the officer.

Not all offices enforce the guidelines the same way, and there is sometimes room for their own interpretation. This also changes from time to time. Some offices always issued under-consideration stamps, and then they stopped, and some do it sparingly.

You can try asking in the group, and I'm sure you will have many reports of full 60 day extensions without an under consideration-stamp.

@Wayne ********

This did happen before in 2021 but it did not last that long.

However they were not doing 45 day extensions, it was still 30 days.

Also they have submitted this proposal multiple times already this year, and the main reason.

We believe the core reason it was approved in 2021 was because of the 14 day quarantine which was required. Before without the addition 15 days you would not have enough leadtime to apply for some visas (after your quarantine you would only have 16 days if they did not extend it).

Once thailand launched the evisa system the need for this was not as necessary, and that's most likely why it was so short lived.

We were referring to the 60 day covid extension, as this comment was originally on a post talking about these extensions.

Yes it is true, and your luck of the draw will also depend on which immigration you apply for it at.

We ensure ahead of time that it is possible for our clients before accepting the case.

Our fee for the described situation is 6,000 THB, and it already includes the 1,900 THB government fee as well as document courier pickup/drop off in Bangkok from your condo/hotel ( all of our in-country services are 100% refundable if not successfully obtained ).

You will receive a full 60 day extension without an under consideration stamp, but please keep in mind that currently the last day to apply for these type of extensions is August 24th, and we may not accept the case if you request too close to that deadline (unless they extend it again).

You can reach our team via LINE here:

@Miguel ************

We can assist with a 60 day extension first (without the 30 day extension).

If you apply on your own without the 30 day extension on a tourist visa or exempt entry stamp it will be up to the officers discretion if they wish to allow it or apply a 30 day only extension.

@Mike *********

This is not entirely correct as some countries do issue passports with the letter O.

But a german passport does not contain the letter O, and can be safely assumed to be a 0.

@Judd *********

This is bad software because in most cases this should fail.

MRZ codes include a checksum, so a 0O error should be avoidable in most cases (the OCR should know it failed).

Not sure why they didn't just opt-out of using 0O all together in your passport number issuance if they must use alphanumeric instead of fully numeric 😓. Many people make this mistake everyday, but passport numbers last 5-10 years. So it's best figuring out beforehand what your passport number really is if you have a O0, and hold a passport from a country which is using alphanumeric passport numbers.