saw this on another forum ...
Guenter Bellach
27 Jun, 15:40
From: [email protected] (Guenter Bellach)
Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 14:40:09 GMT
Local: Wed 27 Jun 2007 15:40
Subject: Bad Surprise at Immigration
I have been legally married to my Thai wife for 14 years, have been
supporting her as well as raising over the years as many as 6 children
out of her extended family whose parents had been unable or unwilling
to take care of them, three of these are in my house at the present
time. And I have been living in Thailand permanently on 1-year visa
extensions for a total of 11 consecutive years now, initially under
the requirement for marrieds of having Baht 250,000 in my bank account
and more lately Baht 400,000.
I thought I was all set for a happy remainder of my life in this
country which I love. Two days ago I presented myself at Immigration
in Phuket for the yearly renewal with all my documents in order (I
thought). All went well at first, the officer dealing with me, amidst
jokes with my wife, completed all the paperwork and handed everything
to his supervisor for signature. Then the trouble started. The
supervisor consulted his rule book and pronounced that Baht 400,000
was not enough, and they could not approve my application. He did not
exactly say how much money I needed on my bank account, but I had the
impression that it was Baht 800,000, the same as for retired people
who are not married to a Thai. Alternately I could prove I had Baht
40,000 per month retirement income. Well neither did I have the one
nor the other. My retirement income amounts to a mere Baht
35,000/month, which happens to be 7 times the income of the average
Thai employee, but apparently the authorities feel the larger amount
is needed for a farang to live on.
So what to do? Do I have to return to my home country where living
costs are much higher and where I would need ALL my income just to
support myself as a single person, and abandon those 4 Thai people who
at the present time depend on me to feed them? Do we long-staying
farangs who have been living a decent life, supporting our Thai
relatives do we not deserve more considerate treatment, and
consideration of the contribution we have making to this country over
so many years? Everybody knows that a very significant part of the
income of many Isaan villagers come from their farang family members.
Has anybody else in this group had a similar experience? What exactly
are the financial requirements for foreigners who are married to a
Thai person to stay here long-term? It seems the Thai government is
turning up the screws all the time. My retirement pension certainly
does not increase at the same rate as their requirements. Do they want
to get rid of us?
i thought it was 400,000 in the bank ,when did they ramp it up again ?