As a British passport holder, you can arrive in Thailand without a visa and receive a 30 day (your arrival day counts as day one) visa exempt stamp in your passport. You can extend this by a further 30 days at Immigration office for 1,900 Thai Baht. After that you need tp leave Thailand. You then need to open a bank account here in Thailand (difficult but not impossible on a visa exempt entry and most banks will want you to have a cerificate of residency from Immigration). It is not possible to open a bank account from overseas. You then need to season 800,00 Thai Baht in your bank account before you can apply for an extension of stay based on being over 50 years of age. So entering on a visa exempt stamp it is not practical to obtain the extension without lkeaving the country. Best to arrive on a 60 day visa which you can extend for a further 40 days which should give you sufficient time to season the money for 2 months prior to applying for your extension of stay.

@Paul ********

That is incorrect. The twice per year is for land border entry using visa exempt. There is no stated limit to the number of air landings using visa exempt. Certainly three should not cause a problem with Immigration but sooner or later Immigration will aski why you are spending so much time in the country and tell you to obtaing a suitable visa for your stay.

@Paul ******

Maybe you are3 the village idiot and cannot read the news. In Thailand many are caught by police or immigration for working illegally without an apporopriate visa. News will inform you of these people being fined, jailed and thrown out of the country.

@Jo *********

You are providing inaccurate advice. It is totally illegal to do any work in Thailand without the apprropriate work visa. If you are caught by police or immigration (and many are every month) then you face heavy fine, jail time, expolsion and banned from returning to Thailand.

I thinh OK if the deposit is then against the new apartment.

I had been on an extension of stay based on being over 50 years (retirement) for a number of years. Then due to puchasing a house I did not have the required 800,000 thb in the bank so I applied for and got an extension based on being married to a Thai lady. However the Immigration officer advised me that I cannot keep changing the reason for extension and that in future I would need to continue to apply for an extension based on marriage. Regardless of her warning, the next year my finances were better and I had no problem in applying for and getting an extension based on being over 50.

Passport and residency certificate from Immigration

Yes. You need a long tern visa or extension of stay to represent the reason that you are spending a long time in Thailand, Basically, Immigration are telling you that you are no longer a tourist.

@Todd ********

Correct. But Immgration will ask.

It is requested by Immigrationb but not always required. Immigration will ask for your 12 month lease and you need to provide it if you have one. If you do not have a lease, then Immigration will question you about your accommodation and may then require additioanl documentatio. In my case, I do not have a lease because I live in my (Thai wife's) home. So I must provide my house book to Immigration.