Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Consular Reports of Death Abroad. We are also discussing Thai Wills, and we are discussing estate matters, so this is sort of international estate but I'm going to kind of keep it to Thailand/America kind of analysis here okay? So what are we talking about? 

First of all, what's a CRDA?  A CRDA is a Consular Report of Death Abroad. It is very similar to the so-called CRBA or C-R-B-A which is a Consular Report of Birth Abroad. A Consular Report of Death Abroad is a Death report that acts as if it was a legal Death Certificate for purposes of usage in the United States. That's of key importance because you have got to understand, there's an underlying Death Certificate for deaths in Thailand as well; it's the Thai Death Certificate. But also, if you have estate matters in the United States you have to deal with, you're going to need the Embassy's Documentation - the Consular Report of Death Abroad - which is issued by the American Citizen Services Section of the Consulate Section here in the US Embassy here in Bangkok, also there is a section up in Chiang Mai. They are going to issue this CRDA, this Consular Report of Death Abroad. The CRDA is then going to be used when you are dealing with things like the deceased party's banking matters in the US. To prove that they are in fact deceased, they are going to want to see some US document to that effect; that's what the CRDA is for. 

Now the CRDA does not much interact with matters pertaining to what we would call in the American Common Law vernacular, “probate”, what the Thais - basically the English language translation is best described as “succession” but basically in our vernacular - and I think it's fair enough - you can call it probate, that's the conceptual effectively understanding of what is going on. They are dealing with the Thai Will and they are primarily dealing with Thai documentation. So the Thai Death Certificate should be sufficient with respect to matters pertaining to that process, with regard to the Thai Will. But with regard to American Estate matters, you're probably, in fact I am pretty certain in virtually all cases, you are going to have to have either the original or a copy of the Consular Report of Death Abroad here in the Kingdom of Thailand.