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Thailand TM28 Update for 2020

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the TM28 form. 

We discussed this at length last year in 2019 and this year we are discussing it again. Those who keep track of Thai Immigration news will probably be aware that this form really didn't come back to prominence until 2019. As a practical matter, it was not really enforced or the usage of the form had just fallen into disrepair for lack of better term; it just wasn't being used. In 2019 that all changed. Now the form itself is a manifestation of the legal framework created under the Immigration Act of 1979 but that being said again as a practical matter we really didn't see it in fact, for nearly a dozen years that I was out here I had never even heard of it really until 2019, and then it sort of came into "vogue" if you will for lack of better term or infamy, I guess, if you are if you are a foreigner living in Thailand. 

For those who are unaware, the TM30 which is one form that requires landlords or possessors of a dwelling, which is a bit vague and can require pretty much anybody that is living someplace to file a TM30. The TM28 is actually incumbent upon the foreigner themselves and it is a slightly different form. Different Immigration offices take a different interpretation of relevant Immigration Law and so usage of this form varies from province to province because it seems to me like some Immigration Offices are viewing the necessity of it or I should say viewing it slightly redundant, especially when used in conjunction with a TM30 which brings us to a recent article from the Phuket News, thephuketnews.com. The article is titled: No Change in TM30, TM28 Reporting Says Phuket Immigration.  Quoting directly: "There have been no changes to requirements for landlords of foreigners and for foreigners themselves to report their own whereabouts under the TM30 and TM28 provisions, a senior officer in Phuket Immigration has told the Phuket News". 

So what to take away from this video? First of all, different provinces apply the rules regarding TM30 and TM28 differently. Chaengwattana here in Bangkok for example takes a different take on it compared to for example Immigration up in Chiang Mai, Pattaya, Chonburi province, Samui for example. So each of these precincts if you will, these jurisdictions, takes a slightly different interpretational perspective with respect to these rules.

That being stated, it does not appear that the posture taken in 2019 has fundamentally altered at least in the near-term in 2020 so I don't think it is particularly prudent to presume we are going to lose TM28 or for that matter TM30. Simply we are going to have to continue dealing with it, albeit dealing with it under the terms we dealt with it in 2019.