Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are asking the question, which Thai Visas don't require insurance? I've done videos like this in the past. I think it's worth a reminder, just a sort of a review, especially for newer people coming in as we're kicking off high season here in Thailand. There are a number of visa options. In fact, this year we have more Visa options than I've ever seen. Frankly a lot of them are contradictory, some of them don't even make sense. I don't know where they get the legal authority for some of these types of visas but long story short this is where we're at. There are a lot of different options out there, so I wanted to make it abundantly clear which visas clearly do NOT require insurance. 

So I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Thailand Medical Insurance rules for foreigners are a muddle. Yeah, that's an understatement. Quoting further: "Other visas not requiring medical insurance are annual extensions for foreigners married to Thais and permits to study the Thai language. However, foreigners with a Department of Employment Work Permit must pay a small proportion of their salary to be included in the Thai Social Security Scheme." Depending on your circumstances, you may not be eligible for Social Security depending on how your Work Permit works; it's going to depend a lot on your specific circumstances. Another visa to mention, which is also mentioned in that article that does not require insurance, is the standard O Retirement Visa. That also does not have an insurance requirement. It should not be confused with the O-A Retirement Visa which is issued from Embassies or Consulates outside of Thailand. That does have an insurance requirement and an insurance requirement for maintaining it. The Thai O Retirement Visa does not have such requirements. 

So, the thing to take away from this video and the thing to understand is yes, there are visas out there that require medical insurance. For example, the LTR Visa, the Long-term Residence Visa; the O-A Retirement Visa requires this. Another example of one that does not is the Thailand Elite Visa, it does not require insurance; nor does a Marriage Visa, standard Non-Immigrant O Marriage Visa. Apparently, the ED Visa but be careful with the ED Visa; issuance on those you can kind of get into some problems if you're dealing with an ED Visa especially if you're only doing it as a pretext. Meanwhile again the O Retirement Visa does not need insurance; Thailand Elite does not but these other types of new visas that we're talking about out here likely will require them. 

So again, I wanted to make this video to be clear which ones DON’T which are basically most of the old school standard Thai Non-Immigrant Visas and the Elite Visa. That said I believe as of at least the time of this video, we're probably going to see Insurance required for most if not all of the other categories of visas for those who remain in long-term status here in the Kingdom of Thailand.