Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Thai Immigration generally and the importance of accounting. Now at first glance this might seem like a video pertaining only to things like Business Visas and things associated with like Work Permits. That's not necessarily the case. Accounting, or should I say proper accounting, can have a profound long-term impact on one's ability to live and reside here in the Kingdom. 

What am I talking about? Well for example, if you just let your accounting go, it's going to be very, accounting is integral to maintenance of Business Visas, maintenance of Work Permits; let's just start there. So dealing with Business Visa status, dealing with ongoing work authorization status, on a yearly basis you are going to constantly have to update your Immigration file; it is going to include a lot of documentation from various tax authorities, various documentation associated with other type of agencies here in Thailand most notably, labour certification sort of hinges oftentimes upon whether or not certain employees are working in a company. That can then pertain to documentation associated with their payroll taxes, associated with their ongoing contributions to various social welfare here in Thailand. So again, what seems like an unrelated thing i.e. accounting has an absolutely fundamental impact on Immigration matters here in Thailand and I really truly believe this is something that most important foreign nationals do not fully comprehend. I didn't really get it when I first got here. It wasn't until a few years after being in Thailand and realizing how integral accounting was to things like my Work Permit that I began bringing in Thai Accountants to the firm; we eventually formed a division that deals with accounting specifically but it comes from the context of dealing with Immigration, dealing with Work Permits and that's why, quite honestly, we are very good at maintaining our clients' ongoing Work Permit and Business Visa status. 

But that is not only the issue when it comes to issues of Immigration and accounting. Things like Permanent Residence, applications for that will have a ton of tax documentation associated with that application as will citizenship. I know this from personal experience because I had to go through the citizenship process and basically all the other immigration process to maintain my status here to get to the point to be able to request citizenship in Thailand. Throughout all of that, believe me tax documentation was a central part of the petitions associated with many of the different benefits that were conferred up to and including my Thai citizenship. So again bear in mind, accounting if you are looking at work in Thailand, live in Thailand, accounting is fundamental.