@Greg *******

agreed, of course if you actually will do an activity for your stay it is no problem. But many people said they will do Muay Thai then cancel after coming…

@Greg *******

let’s see how it plays out! I hope not too time consuming.

@Dany *******

I definitely don’t regret selecting workcation as a category. I reckon there will be far less effort to extend because you don’t have to prove you’re doing some specific activity.

@Sean ******

oh yeah 14k is 2x round trip flights to Vietnam haha.

@Dany *******

it really depends on each office for sure. I’ll be waiting for chiang mai reports. However, knowing what is required will definitely make it easier and faster for the rest of us.

I’d also like to add that it might be worth using an agent to extend this visa… Depends on how much it costs but I value my time a lot… If I/you don’t want to vacation outside Thailand for a few days then an agent extension might make things smooth and fast.

Thanks for sharing this

@Dany *******

, really! Ignore the hate, I don’t get why people have to be so toxic. I for one appreciate your persistence in documenting and sharing the results with us. Well, it’s a bit disappointing and frustrating. Personally I hope for better luck up here in chiang mai. At the same time I might just take a vacation to Vietnam if things are still looking suboptimal.

I was really hoping it would be like before with easy and fast 1-2 hour tourist visa extensions.

Let’s hope this is a bit of a fluke and the newness is overwhelming them hence all the work… I personally am not too excited to go vacation to anywhere else, I’m quite happy here in Thailand. At the same time until this gets sorted out it might be good for my first 6 months to just pop out.

Thanks again for the report. People like you bring a lot of value to this group!

@Will ***********

more specifically it seems they previously had an ED visa, in addition to visa exempt, and they couldn’t pass any Thai language skills test. Imo that seems to be the bigger issue- being on an education visa but having no thai language skills to show for it.

Of course there could be even more details that we aren’t aware of that the poster decided not to share- and I’m not trying to accuse them either, it could be just as simple as that, but some people would omit key details.

In their case it does seem like they were on a dodgy education visa with no real intentions of studying.

Besides that I haven’t heard of anyone having to pay a fine, and just a few cases of people being hassled. I think that most DTV holders get in no problem.

I chose workcation so that I don’t have to continuously prove I’m doing X activity as I should be working regardless of activity. It’s a lot less hassle to pull out my laptop and show my income, which validates my visa, than prove I’m doing whatever I applied for (Muay Thai or cooking or health or whatever).

It doesn’t seem to be any problem now, but I just figured it’s best for me to select the one that best fits me for the next 5 years than do 6 months of an activity and potentially have to prove that I’m continuing said activity on extensions and re-entries.

With workcation I expect easier questions and answers- “what are you doing in Thailand?” Me: “my girlfriend is Thai” (or “I love coffee shops and elephants and Thai food and riding bikes and hiking here”). I can pull out my IG as proof. But with Muay Thai or something they might get strict and verify. No problem if you intend to do it or whatever for 5 years but the only thing I’m likely to keep doing in 3-4 years is work haha. My hobbies and activities might change.

Everyone’s telling OP “go back to the booth” but how? Most likely they made this post after. Anyways if you walk past immigration and then past security in the airport it’ll be extra difficult… So in this case should OP go to immigration office? Yes it’s a good idea to check your stamp before leaving the counter, but if you forget, what’s the next step?