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Gaps in Thai Work Permit Status & Permanent Residence Applications

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Thai work permits in the specific context of Permanent Residence. 

Now what are we talking about here when I say “holes” or when the title of this video says, "holes" in a Thai Work Permit? Well Work Permits are generally issued in one year time frames.  They can be issued for less time; 6 months or 90 days.  They can even be issued in increments of days in a temporary scenario. Moreover, they can also in certain cases, be issued with two years of validity at each renewal; the two-year validity is relatively rare but it can happen. That being said, your routine cases you are going to see work permits that are extended on a yearly basis.

Now with respect to "holes" what are we talking about? Well the Work Permit is not directly connected to the Business Visa so one can have a Business Visa,  they can be getting extensions on it, everything is going fine with that, but a work permit might have a separate expiration date from that of a B Visa and I have seen this rather frequently. People just forget to renew their work permit and it will expire and you have got to go in and reapply for a new work permit and that period of time between the expiration of the one permit and the reapplication for a new permit is sort of a "hole" in ones work authorization.  There is this period of time where one was not technically work authorized.  This is why it's a really good idea to keep track of your work permit expiration date and make certain that an application is made prior to that expiration date for renewal of that work permit.

But that being said, this does happen and it can have rather substantial repercussions with respect to Permanent Resident applications. What am I talking about? Well one of the requirements for Thai Permanent Residence in routine cases is that the applicant have three years of contiguous visa status as well as three years of continuous Work Permit status and in the circumstance where a “hole” has come up in one's work permit, that basically restarts the clock for another three years before one can apply for Thai Permanent Residence.

So the thing to take away from this video is those who are in Thailand and they have been here a couple years and they are pretty serious about one day applying for PR, they need to go ahead and be pretty diligent with respect to vigilantly watching the expiration date of not only their visas but also their work permits, because an expiration of a work permit and a "hole", notwithstanding the fact that one's immigration status might have gone unbroken, can still result in a delay with respect to a Thai Permanent Residence application due to the fact that the three years contiguous work authorization is not met in a subsequent Permanent Residence application.