Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the Thailand Elite Visa. I was talking to a client the other day, we were on the phone and we were discussing Visa options and the options this person may or may not have with respect to staying in Thailand long term. They were comparing Retirement Visa to Elite Visa and they were asking me, they said "Well do I have to do 90-day reporting on Elite Visa?" So I said "yeah you have to do that." "Well if I stay in Thailand full time, do I still have to do yearly extensions?" I said yeah if you don't leave, you have still got to extend your status. It is a non-immigrant Visa, the validity of which is a one year interval and you have got to go get it extended. At a certain point this person asked me, they said "well it just sounds to me like Thailand Elite is kind of a gimmick insofar as I pay up front and yeah, I have some degree of certainty regarding the fact that I have front loaded a bunch of time in, I know I am going to have time in," which I said back and I am not trying to completely disparage the Thailand Elite program here but I said, "Well that is not a foregone conclusion. If Immigration changes the program, I don't think that is overly likely or at least not in any substantive way that would result in folks who had already come in being overly adversely impacted," that being said those type of visas are issued on five years stickers. You could see a scenario where maybe that changes and you have only got what is remaining on your 5-year sticker. Again I think that is unlikely. More importantly yeah it could change. These are Non-Immigrant Visas at the end of the day. In a sense they are kind of like a really long Tourist Visa and he also brought up the fact he said, "Can I work on an Elite Visa?" and I said "presently no." There are proposals in place for folks that invest I believe a million dollars or 30 million Baht into the country. They may be able to get work authorization under Elite although I don't even think that's yet official regulation.

So while I won't say Thailand Elite is a gimmick, it is what it is. It is a Long Stay Visa; you do sort of front load your status with that Visa, but you are still dealing with things like 90-day reporting; you are still dealing with things if you want to just stay uninterrupted without leaving; still dealing with extension of status and as noted in the vast majority of cases there is not going to be work authorization associated with a Thailand Elite Visa.