Transcript of the above video: 

As the title in the thumbnail, and the thumbnail actually, going to go over here to Prachaithai English, that's @prachaithai_en over on X, I saw this cartoon, Cartoon by Stephff: Immigration queue at Suvarnabhumi Airport. And that cartoon, I have seen that person's stuff over the years, it's quite good, I like those cartoons, so I thought I would make it a thumbnail here. That said, quoting directly from a recent article from ASEAN NOW, that's aseannow.com, under the headline: Suvarnabhumi arrivals face 2 - 3 hours immigration queues. By the way, the word "queue", that's a very British term. In American - I guess that's its own dialect of English - we just say lines, but I thought I'd point that out there. Quoting directly: "Foreign visitors arriving at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport are again reportedly facing waits of two to three hours at immigration during some periods, as stricter screening and staff shortages create bottlenecks. Tourism industry sources say the long queues have returned as a major concern at the airports, with the delay affecting travellers' first experience on arrival in Thailand. The problem is most apparent during busy flight periods, when checks can build into lengthy lines. Tougher checks add time at the Border. One factor is the Government's increased scrutiny and suspected Chinese grey- capital groups, transnational criminal networks and the use of special Fast Track services, according to tourism industry sources. The more detailed screening process means immigration officers need longer process individual passengers. Arrivals whose information is incomplete or whose documents require further examination, can add to delays which then accumulate during peak periods." 

Yeah, I have heard a lot of this. And the other thing is look, people don't really want to think about this but they made up all these new visas and even the Immigration Officers have problems sometimes remembering what the protocols are associated with them, the criteria associated with them. As I have discussed in prior videos, that DTV Visa - wholly a creation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs - was then effectively imposed upon the Ministry of Interior which operates internal immigration protocols and checkpoints and again, this disconnect can result in a number of different reasons and mechanisms for why we would be seeing delay processing at the border. 

Again I find a rather interesting that this is occurring during low season when again presumably there are going to be less people going through. Again staffing shortages are also being blamed for the reason that we're seeing these backups in terms of lines, but I actually think that this stems from the fact that the current immigration system is so disorganized with all these different kinds of visas, they all have different terms associated with them. On top of that we have seen a number of them now border runners that are coming about as a result again of things like the DTV. Also as a result of changes in the Visa Exemption System which we are seeing is causing a lot of people I expect to bounce out of Thailand right now because they want to come back and get 60 days before the new 30-day rule comes back into effect. 

So again I think there are a number of factors that are contributing to this. That being said, we will certainly be keeping folks updated on this channel as the situation evolves.