Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing these newly proposed rules. This has been promulgated in principle by the Cabinet that they are going to basically roll out a new regulatory regime for visas for "wealthy" individuals for lack of a better term and they are going to be a much more streamlined Visa process; things like 90-day reporting aren’t going to be required. It all remains to be seen frankly at least the details, so we will keep you updated on that on this channel but it is interesting, there seems to be something of a backlash at an expat level. 

A recent article from ASEAN NOW, that is aseannow.com, that is formerly thaivisa.com, the article is titled: What about us? Furious retirees/expats in Thailand slam proposals to attract wealthy foreigners. Quoting directly: "They feel the Government don't care about people who have committed to Thailand for years. They say the Cabinet's decision is just a cynical ploy to try and get money and taxes - especially from other Asians." Well I don't mean to laugh at anybody but aren't all Government initiatives a cynical ploy to get some taxes? I am not making fun of any Government here. I am not singling out the Thai Government. The American Government comes up with cynical ploys to get tax money daily. That is all Congress does, so again I don't mean to make light but that is kind of stating the obvious. Yes, all Government initiatives tend to be a cynical ploy to get some money out of people. Excuse me. Quoting further: "They feel that they will have to continue to jump through numbing hoops like 90-day reporting because they don't have a million dollars to invest and don't work in Thailand." Quoting further: "They say they bring money in; support the local economy; support Thai people like wives and children but are treated like second class citizens as they are not the "cash cows" favoured by the Government. In fact they feel they are being treated more like buffaloes." 

A couple of things. With respect to second class citizens and this is not pointing something out in like a classist kind of way or caste system kind of way but in point of fact, to be a second class citizen, you have to be a citizen and most of these folks aren't. More to the point, regardless of citizenship, the Immigration Act of '79 is very clear in how it delineates foreigners. There are Permanent Residents who are covered under different sections of the Act and things like TM 30 and 90-day reporting do not pertain to those folks. It does not apply to them. Non-Immigrant Visa categories are by definition non-immigrant and they don't have the inherent rights of abode, rights to residence that a Permanent Resident does. The point I am trying to get at in this video or at least with that maybe some people would call it almost a semantic point is, if you have the ability to get PR, if you really want to just step all of this and never want to have to worry about whatever new visas they are coming up with or 90-day reporting or whatever, just get PR. I know I am saying that in a very cavalier way; PR is a process; it requires commitment; there are costs in terms of time and resources. My point is if you are eligible for that and you are watching this video and you are frustrated by all this that is going on, seriously consider getting PR. That would cure a lot of the frustration. That being said this notion that this creates kind of I would say rather than call it second class citizens creates kind of a two-tiered expat universe. There are presumably going to be these folks in this high-end echelon tier and then folks that can't meet those requirements. It remains to be seen, I have done videos contemporaneously with this one. I know retirees have been very concerned that this may push them out, this may replace the current retiree regime. I don't think that is the case. I think this will exist in addition to the presently operating Immigration regime as we know it. I guess in a sense it could create this two-tiered expat universe; there are going to be folks that have to do 90-day reporting and folks that don't. 

That said, the Smart Visa has been around for a while and those folks don't have to do 90-day reporting and their Work Permit is built in and they don't have to deal with some of the other stuff that folks in the other category or other division of Immigration have to deal with. However, as a practical matter, I don't see a lot of folks, I could be wrong about this, but I don't see a lot of people being in these programs. I mean the Smart Visa was set up and we have certainly assisted folks with the Smart Visa but it is pretty narrow. Most folks frankly preferred not going through the Smart Visa system. I’m not saying there is anything wrong with it but we have dealt with clients that were in Smart Visa and actually preferred to get out of it. They didn't really like the way that it worked in their situation. There are other folks that seem to like it just fine, that is not my point. First of all it is a rather narrow subset of folks and on top of that I just don't know that we are going to see huge numbers of people in this overall category.