WEB BBS MAR 18

BUSINESS SUPPLEMENT
cover story
Image courtesy of
http://www.interactivethailand.com
STAY IN THAILAND FOR FOUR YEARS WITH SMART VISA
The military-run government recently announced
plans to introduce what it is calling a
Smart Visa which will cover a four-year period,
but it will be restricted to what it calls professionals.
The aim is to attract foreign experts
and high-level executives to work in Thailand
by making the entire visa process easier and
longer-lasting, thereby reducing the amount of
bureaucracy and paperwork required from
professionals.
According to reports, the Smart Visa will allow
the bearer and their dependents to stay in
Thailand without the need to report every 90
days to Thai Immigration. As well, depending
on the type of work they will be employed to do,
the bearer may not need to have a work permit.
The aim of the new visa is obviously to lure
skilled foreign workers, something neighbouring
countries such as Malaysia and Singapore, are
also keen on doing. The Thai government has
focused on 10 major industries it believes will
underpin future economic growth in the country,
with technology, naturally, at the forefront.
The Smart Visa will be divided into four categories:
E for Executives, I for Investors, S for
Startups and T for Talent.
Of these four, only the S for Startups will be initially
restricted in terms of length of time. It will
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be for an initial one-year period which can later
be extended. This is sensible as a Startup may
not last the four-year distance anyway.
People eligible for the Smart Visa scheme will
include those working currently in the fields of
science and technology, investors, high-ranking
executives and startup entrepreneurs, but they
will all have to be part of just specific industries.
Some 39 professions will still be restricted to
Thai nationals only, the government keen to
ensure that locals do not lose out to foreign
competition.
The Board of Investment (BoI) believes there
will be around 1,000 applicants a year for the
new Smart Visa, which is hardly an onerous
number. As usual, the devil is in the details
with those who are considering applying needing
to have their application approved first by
the BoI as well as the Digital Economy Promotion
Agency, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
and some other government agencies. Only
once they have passed this first set of hurdles,
a process the government claims will take no
more than 30 days, can the applicant then put
in a formal request for the Smart Visa at a Thai
consulate or embassy.
The Smart Visa was officially introduced at the
start of February and it will now be just a matter
of time to see whether its introduction has the
desired results.
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