Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are asking the question what is the worst that could happen if a person works in Thailand without a Work Permit? Well the worst that can happen is they can be arrested; they can even be jailed under certain circumstances. Detained, deported and fined and depending on the circumstances, the severity of those penalties will go up. 

Yeah this is a question people ask me and it is especially among new expats. I always see this among people that, they are coming in and they have kind of made the decision. They have been here a couple of months and they think “I'm going to do it. I am going to go ahead and try to live and work in Thailand, make a go of this thing”. I just think that folks kind of pose this question, I am not casting aspersions at anybody but it is a little bit naïve because it is one of those things where it is like yeah day today perhaps the odds are low of something happening but if you think about it in the aggregate over time, do you really want to invest time and energy into a place like Thailand and maybe spend three years, five years, seven years, ten years here and not be in compliance because the moment that is found out especially the longer you have been here, believe me when I tell you, Thai Authorities are not happy and are very much keen to go ahead and deport a person that has been doing that. So something to think about.

Again I sort of look at it like perhaps you can maybe look at the odds of it as being a little bit like independent odds on a day-to-day basis but as time builds up, you are really kind of asking for trouble. I have seen folks, this is especially going back 12 to 15 years ago when this was a little bit more common. They definitely did not have the Immigration system, the Immigration enforcement apparatus they currently have in Thailand and people were a little more cavalier about these issues and they got into real problems for it. I saw many people who had built pretty good lives here just done. They were kicked out of Thailand, and they are blacklisted and they can't come back because they were working illegally. So it is definitely something that is you need to do you do diligence; it is a good idea to go ahead and be in compliance if you are going to be resident or living, maybe not resident in the legal sense, but living here in the Kingdom of Thailand.