Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing bureaucratic delays associated with Consular Processing of Thai Visas. I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that's pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Fewer Chinese expected in Thailand this year. Quoting directly: "Smaller factors influencing fewer Chinese arrivals in Thailand are said to be bureaucratic delays in Thai Consulates issuing short-term visas as well as slowness by Beijing Authorities replacing passports which became out of date during the pandemic." Yeah we saw that a lot especially going back about 9 months ago. I was talking to a lot of folks in the West who were saying, "Yeah I am just wading around through the backlog to get my passport issued". We have also seen this more recently. There has been what has been described as 8 to 14 week delays to get US Passports issued domestically in the United States, so can't just point the dirty end of the stick at China over inability to issue passports in a timely manner. I think that's kind of a worldwide problem. Something to think about next time when people start bandying about the notion of entirely shutting down all of our polities, economies and just societies as a whole; something to think about for the future perhaps. But that being said, yeah there appear to be some delays at least nominally associated with Consular Processing.

Quite honestly though that being said especially since the digitization of many of the processes associated with Thai Immigration I have actually noticed things moving in a more efficient direction. Now that said, if you have a high volume, there's only so much that can be done in a given day and let's be clear, folks that work in the Government tend to keep sort of Banker's hours and they tend to kind of keep Banker's schedules. They work sort of 9 - 5, Monday through Friday, there is not going to be a lot going on in the off-hours. Now that is something to bear in mind. Is this only a Chinese issue? As I said the passport thing seems to be something global. We are not noticing a lot of problem Consular Processing out of Thai Consulates and Embassies in the West right now but again that could change at the drop of a hat as we saw at the beginning and during the pandemic itself. So as usual, we will certainly keep you updated on this channel as that situation evolves.