Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing whether or not the Thai authorities are effectively rolling out or re-rolling out, COVID protocol, so the travel protocols associated with Thailand during the COVID, whatever you want to call it, incident, phenomenon. At this point I don't even know what the word is for it, just quite frankly I think all of us got conned on a global level. If you have been watching this channel going back into COVID, you'll see I talked about that even in the darkest days. 

That being said, moving forward and for useful information for the viewers, looking at what we are possibly looking at going into 2025 as we have discussed in other videos E-Visas are now going to become the only way to get a Visa going into 2025. All of the Thai Embassies and Consulates are going to be issuing E-Visas. They are talking about, although we haven't quite seen it fully roll out and it remains to be seen, but who knows, the so-called Electronic Travel Authorization or ETA which looks a heck of a lot like Thailand Pass which was basically the second iteration of what was called Certificates of Entry when they started off with COVID. Then meanwhile they are also implementing something called Thailand Immigration System here in Thailand, again the digitization if you will of the system. 

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Avoiding the hassles of online travel and hotel bookings. Quoting directly: "Vicky's Travel which can also help with entry requirements to most other countries. Quote: "We are finding some people are having trouble with E-Visas or entry authorization procedures," - that was the key phrase there that got my hackles up. - Quoting further: "So helping out there has been added to our services. You might need a travel document as well as a flight ticket these days even to board a plane." Well what does that remind us all of? That's COVID. That was what they were like with all this nonsensical Certificate of Entry stuff. I remember telling clients literally they had to have documentation in quadruplicate just to get into Thailand if they had to go through connections in other countries Now is it going to be quite as Byzantine as what we saw under COVID? I don't know. I kind of doubt it but it could, and a lot of this is basically just those same protocols. So you have to wonder, were they Beta testing this stuff during COVID? 

Meanwhile honestly, I think this is a very bad idea as I discussed in other videos on the part of the Thai Government. Stop making it harder to get into Thailand especially for tourists, okay? People don't want to have to go online and deal with three different websites and six different forms just to be able to come here and relax on a beach, okay. I really think this could be an exercise in killing the Golden Goose and I hope Thai Immigration Officials or those who have a mandate or immigration is within their bailiwick, will see that look this has the potential to really detrimentally impact our tourism sector and I hope that they will think about it accordingly because as we've seen in other instances, as I discussed in other videos, I have dealt with US Immigration for almost 20 years now and as everything is digitized, it's only gotten worse. I've never seen anything get all that much better, okay. It was easier to deal with US Immigration 10 years ago frankly than it is now before they rolled out all the digital portals and all of this stuff because honestly, if you think about it, it makes sense. Government isn't great at doing things at the best of times. When you digitize and then force everyone to use their not-so-great system, it's going to lead to a lot of inefficiency, okay at the end of the day. And I know government people don't like hearing that from time to time, they are a bit inefficient but it's a fact, and I am just hoping that this does not have a tremendously negative impact on the tourism sector here in the Kingdom of Thailand.