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Can A Thai Visa Denial Be Appealed?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Thai visas and we are specifically discussing Thai visas with respect to the notion of being able to appeal a decision regarding a Thai Visa.

Now we need to first of all stipulate a couple of things here.  There is a difference between having a Visa revoked and appealing that revocation and having an application denied.  So for example if one is in the Kingdom on a Thai Non-immigrant B Visa or Thai Retirement Visa and Immigration comes to one’s house, arrests and detains an individual and attempts to deport them, there may be a mechanism for appealing this revocation and having the revocation adjudicated in such a way that it can be rescinded and possibly that individual can stay in the Kingdom, at least for the remainder of their visa.  

That being said, you need to understand that Non-immigrant Visas only provide temporary stay to a non-Thai in the Kingdom of Thailand for a relatively temporary period of time. Generally speaking Non-immigrant Visas are issued in one year increments and re-application for an extension is not probably going to be appealable.  So, if you are denied for an application for an extension of a one year visa, it's not really possible to appeal that because it's at the Immigration Officers discretion to deny that application.  Now they have to base it on some cause, but that being said there are various sections of the Immigration Nationality Act that are very discretionary in nature and so it is going to be very difficult, in my opinion, to go ahead and appeal an application for a visa or visa extension, and similar to the United States Doctrine of  Consular Non reviewability or Consular Absolutism wherein they basically make the presumption that the presiding officer in this case Thai Immigration, but I am using it and analogously with the United States,  Consular Officers at a US Embassy abroad,  they basically say look “they are the fact finder and we are not going to go ahead and overcome or overlook or look over their shoulder I should say, at what they're doing.”  Very similar with an application for a Thai Visa.  If an application is simply refuted, an Immigration Officer can refuse to lodge the application, refuse to accept it due to documentation or form deficiency and moreover if a decision is made even once an application is filed, to deny it there is really not a lot of avenue for appeal as that decision has been made and you are not in any kind of status. There is no vested right for lack of a better term in simply applying.

So as a result I don't think on a visa application it is going to be possible to appeal a denial. That being said the revocation of a pre-existing Visa, that revocation might be appealable depending on the circumstances of the given case.