Integrity Legal - Law Firm in Bangkok | Bangkok Lawyer | Legal Services Thailand Back to
Integrity Legal

Legal Services & Resources 

Up to date legal information pertaining to Thai, American, & International Law.

Contact us: +66 2-266 3698

info@integrity-legal.com

ResourcesVisa & Immigration LawThailand Immigration LawIs the Education Visa Still a Viable Option for Expats in Thailand?

Is the Education Visa Still a Viable Option for Expats in Thailand?

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video would suggest we are going to be discussing the Thai ED visa, specifically in the context of recent crackdowns and raids by Thai Immigration Authorities here in the Kingdom.

What are we talking about with respect to the Thai ED Visa? Well there are other videos on this channel which get into that visa category specifically and we discuss the various restrictions and requirements inherent to applying for an ED Visa but this video is more kind of a discussion of the ongoing overall evolution if you will of the Thai Immigration system and how that plays for Experts here in the Kingdom.

It is a pretty well-known fact there was a time here in Thailand when the ED visa, at least the rules governing it, it was pretty slack;  it was a pretty lax regime with respect to how they adjudicated folks in ED status and that slackness led to a lot of situations where you would see folks in the Kingdom who were basically living here using an ED Visa and as long as you got into a language school or something, and there were a lot of language schools which were basically just set up as a  pretext in order to allow folks to apply for an ED Visa, and let me be clear, there are also genuine language schools which utilize the system,  so you take the good with the bad, but that being said, there was a time when it was more sort of free and easy with respect to ED Visas and the issuance thereof, and that resulted in a regime where you basically had people only using the ED visa as a pretext.

And the point of this video is basically, on the heels of what appears to have been dozens and dozens of raids carried out by the Immigration Authorities here in the Kingdom, pursuant to the X-ray Outlaw Foreigner program as well as the overarching program of so called “Good Guys in, Bad Guys Out”,  basically Thai Immigration Authorities have made it pretty clear that they are targeting schools in raids to seek out those who are not in lawful status or who are using the ED visa simply as a pretext. So basically the point of this video for those watching it, I think it is pretty safe to assume that moving forward, the Thai ED visa is not going to be particularly useful as a pretext just for living here in the Kingdom if you are not really undertaking some course of study and more importantly being able to prove the undertaking of that course of study.

Yes, the ED visa will still going to be around for University students, those taking various legitimate courses, but the era of basically one of these language schools operating as a visa mill, that has basically come to an end.