My previous OA visa was considered to be one of the several long term retirement visas because you can extend it for a full year. Similar for the O visa. You have to be over 50 years old and you can extend the OA and O visa yearly.

I now have the 10 year (5 + 5) pensioner LTR (Long Term Residency) visa. “Long Term Residency” is just the name of the visa. I am not actually a permanent resident which is a whole different thing and for which I am not eligible for.

People think the Thai visa ecosystem is complicated. It is but more so because of the casual misuse of names and terminology.

@Marshal ********

I have the pensioner LTR. They are explicit about targeting “wealthy” individuals which excludes a lot of digital nomads so I agree, it didn’t really address the needs of the digital nomad opportunity. I think about half the LTR’s have gone to pensioners.

@Marshal ********

How so? I’m quite happy with mine.

This is from the Thailand Board of Investment website for the wealthy pensioner LTR

“Personal income under LTR : Wealthy Pensioners’ definition is “unearned income such as a pension, rental, capital gain, dividend, etc”.

@Jo *********

Somehow I knew about this when I applied for the LTR so I looked for the fast track lane when I returned from the US last June.

@Jack ***************

It is considered long term because 1 year extensions are considered long term. Can you use the fast track lane at the airport? - No

@Nicolas *********************

I found the application process to be very easy one year ago. All of my income was pension income which was easy to see on my tax return. The barrier for most people is the financial requirements of $80,000/yr passive income. If your passive income is more complicated than pension income then the application process will be more complicated.

Once they start working on your application the Board of Investment staff are a pleasure to work with.

Using the fast track lane is one of the benefits of the LTR

Dr. MacBook?

@Dee *****

It has always been the case that you can qualify for an OA visa with money in your home country bank. At some point, 1-2 years later, you will be going to Thai immigration inside Thailand to apply for a one year extension of the OA visa. To get the 1 year extension you must have money in a Thai bank account.

The O visa is a different visa with different requirements. Most people pursue an O visa because it doesn’t have a yearly health insurance requirement. The OA visa does have a yearly health insurance requirement.