Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, this is an ALERT; this is a pretty big deal. It looks like there are going to be big changes coming to the Thai Visa Exemption Stamp. For those who are unaware, Thai Visa Exemption is different from Visa-on-Arrival insofar as it is not a Visa per se, as it is an exemption from lawful Visa status in Thailand. The Thais allow this in sort of a reciprocal or a program of reciprocity with various other countries. Last year this was extended in many cases from 30 days to 60; in some cases, I think Russia and Kazakhstan, they went to 90 days at entry, but it now looks like it's being cut back to the 30 days that existed prior to the changes last year. 

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Visa exempt entries to be slashed from 60 to 30 days. Quoting directly: "The Thai Cabinet has agreed to reduce the free visa exempt policy for tourists from two months to one month on arrival. The Tourism and Sports Ministry made the announcement to the Thai press but did not give a date for the introduction of the reduction." We'll get to that here in a moment. As noted, it is Mr. Kenyon down there at Pattaya Mail, hats off how to you sir. Yeah, he gets into this. It's not coming online yet, but we have got a pretty good idea I think of when they are going to bring it online. Quoting further: "The current policy dates from July 2024 when tourists from 93 countries were allowed to stay in Thailand for 60 days without prior approval or filling in forms on arrival. They could also increase their holiday for 30 more days, a total of 90, by applying for an extension at Thai Immigration for 1,900 Baht." Quoting further: "The change from 60 to 30 days has been predicted for months following scandals of tourists working illegally, fraudulent use of nominee trading companies and illegal short-term renting of foreign-owned condominium units. Many of the exposed abuses have involved Chinese passport holders, who provide more entries to Thailand than any other nationality but singling out nationals of specific countries is unlikely at this stage." Quoting further: "Although a date for the new restriction is unknown one possibility is May 1, 2025."

Yeah, as we discussed in other videos, Thai Immigration sort of came out and pushed off a lot of this in my opinion really illegitimate, tax policy, digital integration regarding tax policy, basically World Economic Forum kind of crazy nonsense. Thai Immigration just sort of came out and said, "yeah, yeah, whatever, we are rolling out our TM6 Arrival /Departure system, the digital format. That is coming in May. I have talked about that in recent videos. To my mind that looks like a logical place where we could see this new program also start. It also looks to me like Immigration is effectively just sort of sweeping away all of this globalist nonsense, and good on them for that; hats off to the guys over at the Royal Thai Immigration Police Bureau. That said, quoting further: "This is the date when the new digital TM6, or landing card, is to be introduced for all foreigners to complete online. It is not known at this stage whether Visa Exempt tourists will be able automatically to extend their 30 days by a further month at Immigration, bringing a new total of 60 days. Nor is it known whether these tourists will be able to complete a one-day border hop to receive a further month's stay." 

Hats off to Mr. Kenyon. It is really a good point to bring up that we don't know exactly what this is going to look like, and nothing at this point is particularly a foregone conclusion other than it looks like they are cutting back the exemption. So exactly what Border Running may look like, exactly what arrival at airports may look like, remains to be seen. I expect we will probably have some idea of that. Like Mr. Kenyan notes I expect this will probably roll out sometime right around the time May 1, when we see the new TM6 system sort of roll out. That seems logical to me. Again, never presume logic when it comes to bureaucracies, but generally Immigration, the stuff that they do and the timing of when they do it makes that kind of sense. I would expect Mr. Kenyon is probably right on this. That being stated, we will certainly be keeping you updated on this channel as the situation evolves.