News Forum - Thailand’s tourism revenue falls short of annual target

[Thaiger]

The Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) projected a shortfall in its annual tourism revenue target, with this year’s earnings expected to reach 2.07 trillion baht (US$58,773,427,200) instead of the projected 2.38 trillion baht. TAT Governor, Thapanee Kiatphaibool, attributes this shortfall to the sluggish performance of international tourism receipts, which were significantly lower than the state’s … …

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[Ramanathan.P]

Well...looks like TAT is always looking at the sky. May be it is time they need to look at the ground...
 

https://www.klsescreener.com/v2/news/view/1244821

[Vigo]

A simple tweak of extending the tourist visa from 30 to 60 or 90 days will bring back many westerners who want to visit Thailand during their winter periods. Just make life simple for the profitable demographics and they will come.

[ChrisS]

Not rocket science, older people from the west in particular who have retired would I am sure come in greater numbers if they could get a 90 day visa exemption.

[Viggen840]

Could it possibly be something as simple as feedback from tourists to their friends and mentioning their first impression of landing... at an airport with fellow passengers crammed like cattle in a pen waiting to be processed through immigration by surly officers and half the kiosks empty?

Surely not, could it?

[QECE]

Time to distance ourselves from the false narratives, consciousness and dependency of this circle of tourism. Weary of the predictable promotions thereof...

[BJoe]

Over optimism is a trait prevalent among Thai politicians. That and the seeming death wish for motorcyclists through out the country 

[Viggen840]

5 hours ago, QECE said:

Time to distance ourselves from the false narratives, consciousness and dependency of this circle of tourism. Weary of the predictable promotions thereof...

I remember not that very long ago that the junta wasn't really concerned with tourism - except for the few that wanted to visit religious sites.

[oldschooler]

On 12/7/2023 at 4:41 AM, Vigo said:

A simple tweak of extending the tourist visa from 30 to 60 or 90 days will bring back many westerners who want to visit Thailand during their winter periods. Just make life simple for the profitable demographics and they will come.

Don’t the criminal Russians have 60 Day Visa Waiver Entry ?  
Yet for all law- abiding Western countries it’s still only 30 Days ? 
Again a pure predictable money call.
Thai Govt. know the Russians bring in and bank / invest vast sums of dirty money.

Whereas the invested Westerners are not perhaps  bringing in any new substantial sums.

And any 60 day VE likely to instead result in the penniless western begpackers arriving in droves……

 

[oldschooler]

13 hours ago, Viggen840 said:

Could it possibly be something as simple as feedback from tourists to their friends and mentioning their first impression of landing... at an airport with fellow passengers crammed like cattle in a pen waiting to be processed through immigration by surly officers and half the kiosks empty?

Surely not, could it?

Don’t enter Thailand at Bangkok Airports.Transit to Phuket or Chiang Mai etc.No Immigration Lines in Bangkok Airport Transit. I used the Fast Track at Bangkok before without challenge until they put a guard check there.

[garyknrd]

I am a US expat. 30 days is a joke and I am not broke. 90 days is my bare minimum. Lived there for years and had a great time, but getting older now, and my bank account is getting bigger and I am not interested in a 30 day trip.. If from the US , the SS check is over 2K/mo. If they do not want it then many others do..

I am not interested in the retirement visa. Just want a place to hang out 6 months a year. 

Not interested in working, buying any property, maybe paying a live in for the 90 - 180 days is all I want. 

May head to the Philippines next year to check that out. 

Edited December 9, 2023 by garyknrd

[Manu]

22 minutes ago, garyknrd said:

I am a US expat. 30 days is a joke and I am not broke. 90 days is my bare minimum. Lived there for years and had a great time, but getting older now, and my bank account is getting bigger and I am not interested in a 30 day trip.. If from the US , the SS check is over 2K/mo. If they do not want it then many others do..

I am not interested in the retirement visa. Just want a place to hang out 6 months a year. 

Not interested in working, buying any property, maybe paying a live in for the 90 - 180 days is all I want. 

May head to the Philippines next year to check that out. 

I totally understand what you are saying, I know so many people in the same situation. And a lot of them end up getting dodgy retirement visas via "agencies" as they do not wish to transfer 800 000 bths to a Thai account and not necessarily cause they do not have the money. And of course, a good portion of the money spent on these dodgy visas end up in brown enveloppes, so 90 days would mean almost the end of these dodgy visas and the brown enveloppes that go with them... ah, perhaps that is where the problem lies...

[Viggen840]

29 minutes ago, garyknrd said:

May head to the Philippines next year to check that out

You will probably like the Philippines a lot. Stay away from the southern islands - too much islamic conflict down there.

[BlueSphinx]

TAT (Thai Tourist Authority) is continually tying to attract visitors to Amazing Thailand, but the bureaucratic burdens created by the Thai Ministry of the Exterior (that handles Thai Visa applications) and Thai Immigration (that handles extensions of stay of your Permission to stay) are undermining all the efforts to attract tourists, and in typical Thai style there is no concerted approach nor communication between these 3 players.  

>> Many first time visitors to Thailand are not aware of the ease of the above process, and will be completely flabbergasted when visiting the Thai eVisa site and trying to figure out what's the best Visa option for them when wanting to stay longer than 30 days in Thailand. 

But it's actually quite easy to stay up to 6 months in Thailand, without applying for any Visa.

Just fly-in Visa Exempt (without a Visa) and on arrival Thai border-immigration will provide the large majority of Western passport-holders with a 30-day Permission to stay.

Somewhere in the last 2 weeks of that Permission to stay, visit your local Immigration office (every Province has one) and apply for a 30-day extension of stay.  Costs 1.900,- THB, is provided on the spot and the extra 30 days added to the Permission to stay expiry date you received when entering Thailand.

Then at the end of the 60 days, when your extended Permission to stay is due to expire, do a border-hop.  Such border-hop can be done same day or you can decide to visit the neighboring country you picked to exit Thailand (e.g. Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia or Vietnam). 

On re-entering Thailand Visa Exempt you will again receive a 30-day Permission to stay by Thai border-immigration, which can once again extended for an additional 30-days at your local Imm Office. 

And you can repeat that process also for a 3rd time.  So that will provide you 6 months of stay in Thailand with minimal Immigration or Visa hassle.  At the end of the 6 months, it becomes a bit more tricky to stay even longer but it is surely possible to do it a 4th time.

Note: Anyone interested in doing the above can send me a PM and I will then provide you with some additional information re the required onward-flight reservation when entering VisaExempt and the TM-30 notification you will need for the 30-days extension.  These are simple bureaucratic/administrative requirements that can be done in 5 minutes (if you know how) but you need to be aware of them in order not to be taken aback. 

Also if you want to stay longer than 6 months, there are options with minimal hassle.  

[garyknrd]

1 hour ago, BlueSphinx said:

TAT (Thai Tourist Authority) is continually tying to attract visitors to Amazing Thailand, but the bureaucratic burdens created by the Thai Ministry of the Exterior (that handles Thai Visa applications) and Thai Immigration (that handles extensions of stay of your Permission to stay) are undermining all the efforts to attract tourists, and in typical Thai style there is no concerted approach nor communication between these 3 players.  

>> Many first time visitors to Thailand are not aware of the ease of the above process, and will be completely flabbergasted when visiting the Thai eVisa site and trying to figure out what's the best Visa option for them when wanting to stay longer than 30 days in Thailand. 

But it's actually quite easy to stay up to 6 months in Thailand, without applying for any Visa.

Just fly-in Visa Exempt (without a Visa) and on arrival Thai border-immigration will provide the large majority of Western passport-holders with a 30-day Permission to stay.

Somewhere in the last 2 weeks of that Permission to stay, visit your local Immigration office (every Province has one) and apply for a 30-day extension of stay.  Costs 1.900,- THB, is provided on the spot and the extra 30 days added to the Permission to stay expiry date you received when entering Thailand.

Then at the end of the 60 days, when your extended Permission to stay is due to expire, do a border-hop.  Such border-hop can be done same day or you can decide to visit the neighboring country you picked to exit Thailand (e.g. Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia or Vietnam). 

On re-entering Thailand Visa Exempt you will again receive a 30-day Permission to stay by Thai border-immigration, which can once again extended for an additional 30-days at your local Imm Office. 

And you can repeat that process also for a 3rd time.  So that will provide you 6 months of stay in Thailand with minimal Immigration or Visa hassle.  At the end of the 6 months, it becomes a bit more tricky to stay even longer but it is surely possible to do it a 4th time.

Note: Anyone interested in doing the above can send me a PM and I will then provide you with some additional information re the required onward-flight reservation when entering VisaExempt and the TM-30 notification you will need for the 30-days extension.  These are simple bureaucratic/administrative requirements that can be done in 5 minutes (if you know how) but you need to be aware of them in order not to be taken aback. 

Also if you want to stay longer than 6 months, there are options with minimal hassle.  

I have done it a few times.. A Pain in the a$$, pass

[QECE]

2 hours ago, BlueSphinx said:

TAT (Thai Tourist Authority) is continually tying to attract visitors to Amazing Thailand, but the bureaucratic burdens created by the Thai Ministry of the Exterior (that handles Thai Visa applications) and Thai Immigration (that handles extensions of stay of your Permission to stay) are undermining all the efforts to attract tourists, and in typical Thai style there is no concerted approach nor communication between these 3 players.  

>> Many first time visitors to Thailand are not aware of the ease of the above process, and will be completely flabbergasted when visiting the Thai eVisa site and trying to figure out what's the best Visa option for them when wanting to stay longer than 30 days in Thailand. 

But it's actually quite easy to stay up to 6 months in Thailand, without applying for any Visa.

Just fly-in Visa Exempt (without a Visa) and on arrival Thai border-immigration will provide the large majority of Western passport-holders with a 30-day Permission to stay.

Somewhere in the last 2 weeks of that Permission to stay, visit your local Immigration office (every Province has one) and apply for a 30-day extension of stay.  Costs 1.900,- THB, is provided on the spot and the extra 30 days added to the Permission to stay expiry date you received when entering Thailand.

Then at the end of the 60 days, when your extended Permission to stay is due to expire, do a border-hop.  Such border-hop can be done same day or you can decide to visit the neighboring country you picked to exit Thailand (e.g. Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia or Vietnam). 

On re-entering Thailand Visa Exempt you will again receive a 30-day Permission to stay by Thai border-immigration, which can once again extended for an additional 30-days at your local Imm Office. 

And you can repeat that process also for a 3rd time.  So that will provide you 6 months of stay in Thailand with minimal Immigration or Visa hassle.  At the end of the 6 months, it becomes a bit more tricky to stay even longer but it is surely possible to do it a 4th time.

Note: Anyone interested in doing the above can send me a PM and I will then provide you with some additional information re the required onward-flight reservation when entering VisaExempt and the TM-30 notification you will need for the 30-days extension.  These are simple bureaucratic/administrative requirements that can be done in 5 minutes (if you know how) but you need to be aware of them in order not to be taken aback. 

Also if you want to stay longer than 6 months, there are options with minimal hassle.  

Indeed. I believe this cyclical process can be done almost indefinitely - up to an unlimited period. 

Back when, before they started mucking around with every sorted visa status, most foreign residents find it necessary to be suckered into the non-imm OA [marriage/retirement type] with the burden of high costs and bureaucracy that are attached to these types of cycling long stay visa/permission....believing that there was no other way to get around such nonsense for foreign residence. 

On the contrary - there is still a reasonably simple process in which to trump the non-imm OA draconian requirements. Granted, the alternative might be a little bit inconvenient for some, but makes it up regarding the overwhelming cost and bureaucratic requirements that are associated with the resident visas. 

[garyknrd]

1 hour ago, QECE said:

Indeed. I believe this cyclical process can be done almost indefinitely - up to an unlimited period. 

Back when, before they started mucking around with every sorted visa status, most foreign residents find it necessary to be suckered into the non-imm OA [marriage/retirement type] with the burden of high costs and bureaucracy that are attached to these types of cycling long stay visa/permission....believing that there was no other way to get around such nonsense for foreign residence. 

On the contrary - there is still a reasonably simple process in which to trump the non-imm OA draconian requirements. Granted, the alternative might be a little bit inconvenient for some, but makes it up regarding the overwhelming cost and bureaucratic requirements that are associated with the resident visas. 

Bottom line here is, if you are financially secure you bypass Thailand as an expat.  If you want a 2 week holiday as a sex pat then perfect.  They made the laws. They complain about sex pats but pass laws to discourage people with money.. Personally I could care less now. Let China fill the void if they can get their economy going. If not, then your loss IMO.

[Pinetree]

On 12/8/2023 at 3:34 PM, Viggen840 said:

at an airport with fellow passengers crammed like cattle in a pen waiting to be processed through immigration by surly officers and half the kiosks empty?

What, do you mean the US? Thailand is no worse than most other destinations and certainly better than the US, where everyone is treated like a potential terrorist, or the UK, which is just an inefficient shambles.  I have never had any trouble with Thai immigration processing at BKK. 

[Grumpish]

1 hour ago, Pinetree said:

I have never had any trouble with Thai immigration processing at BKK. 

Same here - in over thirty years the nearest I have had to trouble with immigration was once having to invent what hotel I would be staying at when I was only actually only in transit for three or four hours (not checked through, so had to go through immigration to collect my bag and check in for the next flight). 

[Viggen840]

2 hours ago, Pinetree said:

What, do you mean the US? Thailand is no worse than most other destinations and certainly better than the US, where everyone is treated like a potential terrorist, or the UK, which is just an inefficient shambles.  I have never had any trouble with Thai immigration processing at BKK. 

Within Thailand and having to deal with Immigration Police (as a Non-O) I have never received anything but helpful advice and friendly ser vice.

The only trouble I have on entry at Suvarnabhumi is the cattle yard waiting for processing through the immigration kiosks. What should be fully manned on recognised times and half of them are empty.

I am considering my next entry Opting for the bribe and going VIP complete with golf buggy

[Grumpish]

16 minutes ago, Viggen840 said:

Within Thailand and having to deal with Immigration Police (as a Non-O) I have never received anything but helpful advice and friendly ser vice.

The only trouble I have on entry at Suvarnabhumi is the cattle yard waiting for processing through the immigration kiosks. What should be fully manned on recognised times and half of them are empty.

I am considering my next entry Opting for the bribe and going VIP complete with golf buggy

Or cough up for a seat at the pointy end of the plane. Doesn't get you the golf buggy, but it does get you the fast track.

[oldschooler]

12 hours ago, garyknrd said:

I am a US expat. 30 days is a joke and I am not broke. 90 days is my bare minimum. Lived there for years and had a great time, but getting older now, and my bank account is getting bigger and I am not interested in a 30 day trip.. If from the US , the SS check is over 2K/mo. If they do not want it then many others do..

I am not interested in the retirement visa. Just want a place to hang out 6 months a year. 

Not interested in working, buying any property, maybe paying a live in for the 90 - 180 days is all I want. 

May head to the Philippines next year to check that out. 

Phil is Dangerous , Difficult, Done I reckon. Had a wonderful Phil Girl but couldn’t stand the place.

All types of Thai Visa are more difficult these days. Your 30 day Visa Exempt is Extendable to 45 Days.

Then a quick weekend or one day visa run flight to say Penang gives another 45 days. Might be easier there than in West to also do a 60-90 day Tourist Visa over that weekend at Thai Consulate ?

[yselmike]

20 hours ago, oldschooler said:

Don’t the criminal Russians have 60 Day Visa Waiver Entry ?  
Yet for all law- abiding Western countries it’s still only 30 Days ? 
Again a pure predictable money call.
Thai Govt. know the Russians bring in and bank / invest vast sums of dirty money.

Whereas the invested Westerners are not perhaps  bringing in any new substantial sums.

And any 60 day VE likely to instead result in the penniless western begpackers arriving in droves……

There's money to be made in 30day  visa extensions,1900 baht if you do it yourself,4k minimum if you use an agent.A lot more for retirement and business visas etc.

 

 

[yselmike]

2 hours ago, Grumpish said:

Or cough up for a seat at the pointy end of the plane. Doesn't get you the golf buggy, but it does get you the fast track.

I'm over 70 so I get fast track.

[oldschooler]

3 minutes ago, yselmike said:

There's money to be made in 30day  visa extensions,1900 baht if you do it yourself,4k minimum if you use an agent.A lot more for retirement and business visas etc.

 

3 minutes ago, yselmike said:

There's money to be made in 30day  visa extensions,1900 baht if you do it yourself,4k minimum if you use an agent.A lot more for retirement and business visas etc.

My point is as Russians get 60 day VE so should westerners