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ResourcesVisa & Immigration LawVisa NewsWhy Do I Have to do 90 day Immigration Reports in Thailand?

Why Do I Have to do 90 day Immigration Reports in Thailand?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests we are discussing the 90-day reporting regime here in the Kingdom with respect to 90-day reports which need to be made with Immigration.

I made this video because although we discussed at length this topic in other videos on this channel, we were mostly discussing them in sort of the mechanics of the 90-day report and I really didn't get into the sort of the "why"; "why do we have to do a 90-day report in Thailand?" 

Well I was having this conversation with some expat friends the other day and they were somewhat interested in the answer, or at least my analysis of it, so I figured probably a video on this is warranted.

So I get this question fairly, not overly frequently, but often; often enough that I take note of it that basically other foreigners here in the Kingdom will tell me “hey I have been in Thailand for 10 years. Why am I doing this 90-day reporting thing?” Or “they issue a 1 year visa but then require that I return to do 90-day reports every 90 days if I don't leave the Kingdom”.

Well the reason for it is, it is actually part and parcel with the inherent nature of the underlying visa itself. As most people sort of say but they kind of overlook, most of the folks that are in Thailand in long-term visa status are here in some sort of non-immigrant category and that literally means that they are here on a temporary basis, whereas folks that have Permanent Residence here in the Kingdom of Thailand, they are not presumptively here on a temporary basis. Well what has that got to do with 90 day reporting? Well 90 day reporting was essentially set up to keep track of those in the Kingdom for temporary purposes because those who immigrate, those who have an immigrant Visa AKA permanent residence, they go into the house registration book system and as we have noted at length in other videos on this channel, the Thai House registration book system sort of acts as an ongoing census for example. It provides, it is very useful with respect to constructive notice with respect to service of process in  Court proceedings etc but those who are here temporarily, they are not in the house registration system and as a result of that, they don't, there has to be some mechanism to keep track of those folks and the Thai immigration Authorities in their wisdom decided the 90 day reporting scheme was the best way to go about keeping track of those individuals.

So the next time you are sitting around wondering why am I doing this? Well it has a lot more to do with the inherent nature of the underlying visa category than it does with any sort of ongoing desire on the part of the Thai Authorities to make one have to show up every 90 days and report with respect to their address; it is basically just a measure to keep track of folks who are in the Kingdom on a presumptively temporary basis.