Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Smart Visas, LTR Visas and 90-day reporting. For those who are unaware, most categories of visas require 90-day reporting here in Thailand. It is my opinion that legally speaking all visas require 90-day reporting, I will get into that analysis in a moment. 

That said, we are talking about two rather niche Visa categories quite frankly - the Smart Visa and the LTR - which to this point have only been utilized by a fairly narrow subsection of folks looking to travel to Thailand and remain here on a long-term basis. I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Plea to exempt some foreigners from 90 days report. Quoting directly: "To date, there are only two Visas which exempt foreigners from the 90 days of bureaucracy: the four year Smart Visa (widely used in the Economic Corridors for foreign technology experts)" or technological experts I should say, "and the 10-year Long Term Visa aimed at rich global citizens, retirees on high pensions and executives looking to enjoy the income tax benefits." 

As noted previously, I still fail to see why these are exempted from the 90 days reporting. Now I'm not saying this because I'm trying to be obtuse or cause problems for folks in those Visa categories, but I have read the Immigration Act of 79 and it is pretty clear, you are either a Permanent Resident which is different than long-term resident visas - LTR Visas are not Permanent Residence, they are just sort of a really long Visa - but everything that isn't Permanent Residence is Non-Immigrant status; basically you are not an immigrant. And if you read the Immigration Act of '79, anybody that is in Non-Immigrant status needs to deal with 90-day reporting. That's how I read it, I could be wrong, I may be missing something but I have reviewed it quite frequently and I fail to see how these visas are exempt other than I just see a lot of people saying they are exempt.  

So the purpose of this video though is to point out that yeah, these two rather narrowly utilized visas may afford someone using the Visa the ability to avoid the 90-day reporting requirement at least as of the time of this video. Now that may change, and as we have discussed in other videos made contemporaneously with this one, I think that there is some reason to believe that at least in the coming possibly next couple of years we could see major reforms to the Thai Immigration System and we might see hopefully major changes to 90 day reporting; maybe they get rid of an entirely or they go to some sort of biannual setup whatever, all of which would be an improvement over the need to do it every 90 days which causes a great deal of frustration I have found amongst the foreign community here in Thailand. That said, we will keep you updated on this channel as that situation evolves.