Visa based on marriage-Different address

[Ripa]

 

Hi,

I am officially married with my Thai wife. We have together 2 kids. My intention is to change my visa based on retirement to a visa based on marriage. I have previously used an agent for my visa matters, but now my income limit exceeds the required monthly income of 40,000 bht, so I can now handle my visa myself.  My problem is that my wife’s and our children's official address is at my wife's place of birth, but I live together with her and our kids at a different address, but anyway in the same city as my wife’s place of birth.  Could this cause problems when I apply myself for a visa based on marriage?

 

[BlueSphinx]

Hi Ripa,

Here some considerations which you might find useful: 

#1 - When switching the 'reason' for the application of your 1-year extension based on your Non Imm O Visa from 'retirement' to 'marriage', the Immigration Officer will first check whether you did meet the requirements under which the 'retirement' extension was provided to you during the 12 months preceding your application for your new extension. 

But you wrote that you made use of an Agent to apply for your current 1-year extension. If you only used the agent for 'hand-holding' (him taking care of the administration, checking your application and applying on your behalf) there will be no problem.  But if you used the agent to circumvent the +800K funds in bank requirement, you will not be able to meet that very first check made by Immigration. 

If that's the case, there are only 2 ways to do the 1-year extension application yourself:  

a- Ensure that you have evidence of the required funds on your personal Thai bank-account in the 12 months preceding your application.  In your case that would probably mean that if you start now with having +800K/+400K on your Thai bank-account, it will take more than a year before you will be able to satisfy the 'Funds-in-Bank' requirement for a 'retirement' extension application.

b- Exit Thailand without a Re-Entry Permit,  re-enter Visa Exempt, and when you have at least 15 days left on the 30-day Permission to stay you received on re-entry, then apply for a 90-day Non Imm O Visa for reason of marriage at your local Imm Office.  Note that you would have to check the requirements for such application at your local Imm Office (every Thai Imm Office has its own interpretation of how the requirements need to be met). And at several/most Imm Offices, they would want to see already 12 months of +40K before the date of application. 

#2 - As you suspect, the official address of where your wife/children are staying being different than the one where you are actually staying will be a problem.  There will be a 'home visit' during the 'under consideration' period as part of the application process for the 1-year extension, as Immigration will want to have proof that you and your wife/children are living under the same roof.  So your 'official address' will have to be the one for which your submitted a TM-30, and it will be that address that will be checked whether you are actually living there with your wife. 

#3 - When you have Thai dependent children, you might consider applying for the 1-year extension for reason of Dependent Thai children, instead of for reason of Marriage.  The financial requirements for such application are lower (at least if you apply using the Funds-in-Bank method), but be aware that not all Imm Offices allow application for reason of Dependent Thai children.

CONCLUSION > It is doable to switch from retirement to marriage for your next 1-year extension application, but you would have to meet Immigration requirements for #1 and #2, which is far from simple.  And note that a 1-year extension application for reason of Marriage (or Dependant Children) has a whole lot of additional bureaucratic requirements to be met, reason why some long-term stayers even when they are officially married to a Thai national, prefer to apply for the 1-year extension for reason of Retirement, with its higher financial requirements, rather than being confronted with the sometimes bureaucratic nightmare and red-tape of a Marriage-application.