@Gregor *********

These tourists spend much more than 2000 once they are in the country. The money going into the economy by attracting more tourists more than makes up for one time visa fees.

@Gregor *********

Most tourists are here for less than 30 days.

I would think the tourist generated income throughout Thailand would be more important than the visa fee income.

90 day entries may decrease the workload at immigrant which they may think is a good thing.

If you are living in Thailand you should be here on a long stay visa. It would be pretty easy for immigration officials to question and deny entry to those abusing a 90 day entry when there are alternatives.

Sure, 90 days to start would be more convenient to those looking to get through the process of getting a non-O and a one year extension but not that much easier. Something that new expats might appreciate more would be making it easy and straightforward to open a bank account in the first place. Allow people opening a bank account to easily demonstrate that they were pursuing a long term visa.

@Noel *********

Yes. Dr. MacBook Thailand. I’ve been to them twice and they have been helpful.

Dr. MacBook

I would think that if you report that the passport has been stolen then it would no longer be valid. Once you apply for a new passport, to replace a stolen one, then the old one doesn’t matter even if you got it back.

I recently got a new US passport in 4 weeks.

I make a direct wire transfer from my US bank to my Thai bank. My US bank does not charge a transfer fee for international transfers. I assume both banks take their cut during the currency exchange.

I tried to set up and use Wise last year but was unsuccessful. Long story except to say I don’t trust the service though many other customers love Wise.

@Jorge ***

OK. I checked the Citizen services website and it is a different process to pay for the return envelope. That’s too bad. It was super easy not long ago.

I renewed my US passport a couple of months ago. I just followed the directions on the embassy website. Regarding the 100 baht for the return postage - the US Embassy website has a document, in English and Thai, with instructions to the Thai bank about exactly what the Embassy wants for a bank draft. I handed the document to a regular teller and she gave me the bank check in a couple of minutes. Couldn’t be easier. What was more difficult was realizing that I had to get to a different State Department website to pay the passport renewal fee but that, in the end, wasn’t difficult either. The embassy website tells you to send all your documents using EMS or DHL. I chose EMS. I got my new passport 4 weeks 3 days later sent to my home in Sisket province.

A good reason to extend as a retiree