Expats' 90-day rule a waste of time

Most of the Immigration people are smiley and genuinely interested in serving expats, but, when you get to the final stage of whatever procedure you need, the officials in charge add a fourth dimension to arrogance and rudeness, and most definitely are not “smiley-faced”.

If Halloween mask-makers could get a mould of the face of the captain manning the retirement-visa desk they would make a fortune – scary! 

The real tragedy of it all is that, in the case of 90-day reporting, 75 per cent of the no-fee procedure is unnecessary and a total waste of some 150,000 to 200,000 expatriates’ travel time every year. Immigration’s explanation is that they must confirm our location – “same address as 90 days ago?” But no one has ever come out to check where I really live, and no one can find any of the 1,000 kilos of paperwork I have completed in eight years. 

So why not inform retirement-visa applicants that they can check back just once a year, but must report any new address within 14 days? 

Logic and reason do not seem to enter into Immigration’s 90-day reporting regulation.

Don Aleman

Pattaya