The trip to secure the new visa stamp – speeding drivers, bumpy roads, and a torturously long journey – can be hellish.
There are other ways to stay in Thailand, of course. You could actually work here in Thailand with a proper visa and work permit, pay taxes, contribute to the Thai economy and become part of Thai society.
Or you could enrol in an education programme that would entitle you to a one-year stay.
If you’re aged over 50 and have either B800,000 in the bank, or can prove you’re earning more than B65,000 (from overseas) per month then you can apply for a retirement visa.
You could also get married to a local, though you still have to show an adequate income if you want to stay long-term.
If you do manage to get the visas however, you’ll still have to drop by your local immigration department every 90 days (until the end of time) to ensure they know you are still learning, living, working or retiring in Thailand.
The routes to having the right to reside here – proof of earnings, learning Thai, finding employment – are presumably intended to allow the state to be selective about who is allowed to live in Thailand.
The reality however is quite different. There are many expats who ‘live’ here year round, on a revolving door of ‘tourist’ visas, who are officially jobless, doing what they can to make ends meet and who can barely string a Thai sentence together.
Thailand knows they’re here – the existence of so many visa run firms testifies to this. The continued, costly charade is an odd waste of time for all concerned.
For those who continue to brave the buses to the Malaysian border just to secure another 30 days in paradise, it might be better to settle on the other side, where for those with the funds, there is the successful MM2H (Malaysia My Second Home) scheme and the offer of a 10-year renewable visa.
But if the visa rules in Thailand appear overly complicated and perhaps lead to the temptation simply to ignore them all, a word of caution. This week’s arrests of a Canadian and two Britons, found without visas and now facing fines and deportation offers a simple lesson: try it, and sooner or later they’ll get you.