Transcript of the above video: 

The title to this video is a little bit clunky; what are we talking about? Well the so-called Thailand Elite Visa which is what it was always touted as in the first, well I should say in the Thaksin Shinawatra era of the mid-2000s, so 2005, '4, '5, '6, somewhere in there, I believe they created the Thailand Elite Visa program back then. 

If you go back in time, use the time machine to go back in time, it didn't look anything like what we have seen the Thailand Elite Visa be since then. It actually was initially like a never-ending multi-entry Business Visa was effectively how it worked out. Then he was no longer in power; it was sort of mothballed for a long time, then it came back, and it was sort of retooled, and it became a maximum of a 20-year Visa. It is not a Non-immigrant Visa in the strict sense of the term. It is basically like a long Tourist Visa. Also as discussed in other videos, it does not confer in and of itself work authorization - that is a big misnomer out there about it - and then it sort of later evolved again, a couple of times roughly in the last 5 years we have seen many different iterations now with regard to pricing, the different plans associated with it, and then they went ahead and changed the name; it started being called Thailand Privilege Visa instead of Thailand Elite which I don't know why they did that. That said, what we are getting into here is due diligence associated with getting into that status. And in my opinion, due diligence is a good idea for anybody looking to get into Thailand Elite for a variety of reasons which I will get into here in a minute.  

I thought of making this video after reading a recent comment on our channel, quoting directly: "On June 18th I was denied a Thailand Privilege 5-year Visa at BKK (Bangkok). The only reason given was "flying to Vietnam" for 2 days looked suspicious. Thailand Privilege staff who met me at the terminal couldn't provide much support as they said in their system, I was already approved." Well this is first of all where you get into two different things. Being in the Thailand Privilege, or Thailand Elite “membership system”, is not the same thing as being approved for the visa from Thai Immigration. Immigration is the Government. The Thailand Privilege or Thailand Elite Visa is administered, I think the company is actually called Thailand Privilege Co. Ltd, I can't remember the exact title of the company, but it's done by a private group. It is done by a private enterprise that then has sort of this special concession to get these Visas granted to their membership. There are times when Thai Immigration will reject a visa application even though you have been approved to be in the Elite system. I have actually seen cases in the past where this was kind of an egregious problem where basically people put up real money and were told, "hey you are in the system”, but immigration wouldn't issue the visa for varying different reasons, and they probably have good reason. 

But long story short, the reason for this video is to reiterate, it's not a bad idea to contact a legal professional first and basically tell them your situation, tell them what you are looking to do and then ask, "hey is first of all the Thailand Privilege the best visa for me?" I have told a lot of people over the years that - I have pushed a lot of people into the system, not “pushed” but advised it's a good idea in their factual circumstances, and I have also told people over the years that, "hey there may be a better visa option for you based on what you want to do" - it oftentimes revolves around work authorization analysis. But long story short, yeah, also a component of this being a good idea to seek advice before going into the system, is the notion of this due diligence so you don't end up putting up money going into the system being “approved” to be in their membership program, without being approved for the underlying Visa. That could in theory happen, and for that reason it's not a terrible idea to do your due diligence prior to engaging in or paying out large sums of money to anybody here frankly, with regard to visas here in the Kingdom of Thailand.