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Thai Retirement Visas: Can a Visa be Revoked for Fund Deficiency?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Thai Retirement Visas yet again. 

It has been a major topic of discussion lo these past few weeks. I have been trying to do videos on this to keep people apprised of how things are working and provide some insight into the practicalities of maintaining a Thai Retirement Visa in the aftermath of these rule changes or more likely I should say the administrative and enforcement attitude toward the Thai Retirement Visa rules from 2019 onward.

This video has been done mostly because I have received a number of emails on this topic and basically the question comes from folks which "Look, I had to fall below either the 800 or the 400 thousand baht threshold in my bank account at some point during a given calendar year. Will this result in automatic revocation of a Thai Visa?"  The short answer to that is "No I do not believe so."  Essentially and they have somewhat changed this.  Now Thai Retirement Visas, especially for those using funds held on deposit in a Thai bank account, they have created a new scheme whereby they adjudicate whether or not the person actually has the funds and the new adjudication scheme results in the individual needing to show money in the account  60 days or two months prior to the application for extension and then when one goes in for one's 90-day, presumably one’s 90-day check in, they go ahead and check again to make sure that the funds have remained on deposit from the initial extension to the 90-day mark.  So two months prior to application for extension, 3 months following the extension being issued, they are going to check and make sure there is 800,000 baht in that account and presumably they are going to want to make sure that it was there that whole time. Then throughout the rest of the year, the interpretation of the rules now state that you need to maintain 400,000 baht year round in order to get an extension the following year. 

The question arising is, will falling below the 400,000 Baht in the less strenuous or less scrutinizing aspect of the year, will that result in an automatic revocation of a retirement visa? I do not believe so. I think under any sort of plain analysis if you will of Retirement Visa issuance, once you've gotten through that last 90 day recheck of the balance, I don't think if one falls below 400,000, that one will automatically have their visas revoked.  Most notably because how would you trigger a notification to Thai Authorities that the Visa needs to be revoked; as a practical matter it is difficult for them to see it. Moreover, again the visa has been issued. There is a certain plenary aspect to these things and at some point there has to be a kind of finality to that given adjudication the point of which the 90 days has elapsed ha the recheck has been completed and it's been ascertained that the individual in question does have the funds.  Yes technically, by falling below the 400,000 Baht threshold you don't meet the evidentiary requirement for a renewal so a future renewal may be problematic, but does it result in an automatic revocation of the visa itself? No I don't think that's going to happen. That being said I could be wrong. They could make am administrative determination tomorrow that says just the opposite of what I'm saying now but I think under an analysis of the current situation,  “no, falling under the 400,000 baht is not going to result in an automatic revocation of a Thai Retirement Visa.”