Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing what I call the Work Permit "workaround". So what are we talking about here? Thai O Marriage Visas are often as the name suggests are issued to foreign nationals who are married to a Thai. There are Financial requirements associated with this either 40,000 Baht coming in as either a pension or income into a Thai Bank Account, I'll get into income in a moment, there are some specific areas to watch out for with respect to income, but also there is a bank balance requirement associated as well or I should say a bank balance associated with Thai O Marriage Visa renewal which could operate instead of the income requirement. I will get back to the income requirement in a minute. 

Bank balance requirement is 400,000 Baht in a Thai Bank Account is necessary to secure the renewal or the extension of a Thai O Marriage Visa on a yearly basis. But, there may be sort of a workaround associated with having to maintain that balance if you have a Work Permit in Thailand. For most folks, especially like Americans for example, the minimum salary requirement is 50,000 Baht and if you have a Work Permit, you are going to have to make that a salary to get that Work Permit issued. As a result, those funds supersede if you will the 40,000 Baht requirement for income and also bear in mind with regard to income there is sort of passive income like pension that may be used but I have seen folks have problems in the past utilizing income in a Thai bank account without a Work Permit. They are just in Thailand on an O Marriage Visa and they are like for example working under the table. We saw this heavily scrutinized some years ago and Thai Immigration takes that seriously. They sort of say, "why do you have an income if you don't have a Work Permit in Thailand. You can't work here so where is this money coming from, and you don't have a pension." I have seen cases where visas actually were revoked; they came to us after the fact. We did end up finding folks like that a solution but where visas were revoked because Immigration said "hey we know you are living here on an O Marriage Visa but you don't have work authorization". A Work Permit gets you beyond all these issues because again the mandatory salary associated with a Work Permit again for most Anglosphere countries, Western countries most notably America, I have dealt with a lot of Americans in this regard, yeah 50,000 beats the 40,000 and you have a Work Permit, that is the workaround. You are no longer dealing with this financial evidence stuff. The Work Permit in and of itself is the evidence. So again, I kind of look at this as a "workaround" for issues associated with maintaining bank balances to maintain Thai O Marriage Visa status here in the Kingdom of Thailand.