Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing, well we are discussing matters pertaining to – I have discussed this in the past - so-called “mixing” the financial evidence if you will associated with Retirement Visas. What are we talking about?

Well, the standard two ways of proving financial resources for a Retirement Visa – both issuance and extension – are, one) you can put 800,000 Baht in a Thai Bank Account, two) you can prove that 65,000 baht per month is coming inbound to Thailand from overseas for pension; basically, to prove up that one is receiving some form pension to meet the ongoing financial criteria associated with maintaining the Retirement Visa. So okay, one way to do it, lump sum, 800,000 Baht. Another way to do it, 65,000 Baht per month.

Now I did a video some time ago and I made a correction and of course I got burned by all the trolls and things that sit around out there in the comment sections of the ether of the internet because I guess they have nothing better to do, but I had said, Look, and I still stand by this, the mixed method was, it has always been at the discretion of officers. But yes, it is written in the regs that it is possible to have some mixture of either the 800,000 or the 65,000 baht. As we will get into here and a I have said many, many times, it is not optimal. You really should not rely on the ability to mix, if you will, to show, and what we are talking about here is showing a balance less than 800,000 Baht and then showing that one brings in less than 65,000 but somehow in the aggregate be able to put them together to meet the criteria. It relies on the discretion of the officers, and it is just never a good idea when dealing with bureaucracy to try to do anything that is fluid or gray and use that as the basis for maintaining some form of status or obtaining some form of status rather than clearly delineated guidelines. What I am saying here is it is clear, if you have 800,000 baht in the bank account, Boom, again there are some timing requirements and elements and “seasoning” now associated with bank balances but at the end of the day, if you can show the 800,000, that clearly shows that it meets the criteria. Same deal with 12 months’ worth of ongoing incoming remittance is more than 65,000 per month, if you can show that Boom, it is clear. The Immigration Officer can see it and they can adjudicate accordingly. When sort of making them have to do their own analysis on some sort of fluid combination thereof, you are really just kind of asking for trouble in terms of dealing with visas and dealing with getting these things sorted out.

That said, I thought of making this video because it looks like it is getting even more difficult with regard to the so-called “mixed” method especially as banks are chiming in. A viewer sent me an email; I will keep them anonymous but that said, quoting directly: “Hi Ben, just viewed your latest video about the bank’s visa deposit requirements. I extended my visa last month and would like to add another disturbing aspect to the - and we will just call it – Big Bank’s policy. I had always intended to extend the visa relying on the third option immigration provides.” Yeah, I have got to be honest. I need to stop there; you shouldn’t. I have talked about this in other videos. I get it. It is sitting there. You can see that that is a possibility; it is not optimal. Relying on that to begin with was not the best course of action. That said, quoting further: “That is combination of monthly revenue when less than 65K plus a deposit that combines to 800K or more per annum.” Yeah, again, I get what you are saying, but as we see, it is not working out so well. And frankly, even if we didn’t have the banks pulling all this stuff that they are currently pulling, we never saw this work out well in the past in any circumstances, just as it was even before let’s call it 2020. That said, quoting further: “Last year the Immigration Officer said that this wasn’t a problem but the bank will have to provide a statement showing the relevant deposits summing to a total so he could verify the total funds I was relying upon. He even showed me a typical letter they required, ironically from this “big bank”.” Quoting further: “Armed with this knowledge, I then moved 600,000 from my savings account to a term deposit account, primarily to present to immigration the yearly revenue plus 200K left in savings account; the extra interest didn’t hurt either. Fast forward to this year’s extension. I went to the bank to request the letter but was told they don’t do these anymore. They used to do them, but it was done manually at head office, and they had subsequently discontinued the process.” So now, one of the main major big banks that most people use here in Thailand, won’t even issue documentation associated with “mixed finances” for Retirement Visas. That is an important data point moving forward. That said, quoting further: “I can understand this decision because it would be a labour-intensive task sorting out the relevant deposits from maybe scores of irrelevant deposits. I then asked for a letter to certify my savings account, which had less than 800K in it, but they refused stating they would only issue a letter if there was 800,000 or more in it.” Again, I have said this for years. Relying on this sort of discretionary third option, this is the reason I have sort of discouraged people from going down that road. Quoting further: “I argued that the letter was only to certify that the photocopied savings account handed to immigration were indeed true and accurate copies – it must be dated the same day as the application date - and that it wasn’t the bank’s responsibility to ensure financial compliance, but it was disregarded. I subsequently produced my term-deposit book, and they issued a letter confirming total savings over 800,000.”

So okay, basically, at the end of the day, there was sort of a happy ending here. That said, there is more going on in this that I am not going to get into – and tip of the hat to the person that sent this to us.

Long story short, the reason for this video, again, not the best idea by any stretch of the imagination to try and use these mixed – basically what I am trying to say - don’t try to get creative. I know the foreign community sits around and nitpicks over various regulations, laws, etc., and tries to come up with new and innovative ways of doing things. In nearly 20 years, I have never seen much of anything new and innovative really work in any bureaucratic capacity. So the thing I would take away from this video is at the end of the day, really the two criteria associated with O - or O-A for that matter - Retirement Visa Extension that really matter, are the 65,000 Baht a month in monthly income proven up, or 800,000 Baht balance in a Thai Bank Account again proven up, and trying to use anything mixed moving forward is just not a great idea.