If you follow my stuff you are likely already aware of the complaints i have put forward about the various experiences I have had in regards to obtaining a visa for Thailand. Here is the tl;d
- Was rejected for a visa in Australia (Brisbane) because I am not Australian and they wont process visas for anyone who isn't.
- Was rejected in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for not having a criminal background checks that has to be certified by the FBI and takes 6 weeks to process
- Was rejected in Penang, Malaysia for having too many stamps in my passport (not too many THAI stamps, for having too many stamps in general. If you travel too much they wont let you in apparently.)
So this time I decided to come to a consulate I have never been to before in Vientiane, Laos.
This is a very heavily traveled route for visas for expats living in Thailand. Unlike the places I had gone in the past, most of these people are living either in Chiang Mai, Bangkok, or other places north of the center of the country. There are far more expats living in these areas so I expected there to be a crowd of people... and there was.
I arrived really early in the morning because my hotel is directly accross the street from the Thai Consulate only to discover that there was already a line of several hundred people queuing up to get in when the doors open at 8. This was frustrating to me but then a guy approached me about "use agent, skip line."
Since I consider my time to be quite valuable I decided to take him up on this, although I had my doubts. He told me that the cost for the service was going to be 1000B (around $33) and I wasn't feeling very well so I just decided to go ahead and do it. I am extremely glad that I did.
They filled out my application for me and are familiar with the nuances of this particular consulate (trust me, this is very important since each consulate seems to march to the beat of their own drum and there are no global standards,) they arranged my photos and then the best part was that when the time came we were ushered down a special line that took us directly to the front of the queue.
While some people might be irritated by this (the ones who didn't use an agent certainly would be) but my ticket number was 31, I noticed some numbers as high as 500 towards the back of the line. The agent went with me to show me where to wait, and stuck around to help should there be any problems. Then they gave me a coffee and gave me specific instruction on what time to be there tomorrow in order to pick my passport up.
In total on was in the Consulate grounds less than 30 minutes. The people who didn't use this service are likely going to be there for many hours.
Is $33 too much to pay for this? I don't know and I honestly don't care. Getting a visa to Thailand is becoming more and more difficult as the years go by and for me anyway, the lack of stress involved with paying someone else who knows the system is totally worth it.
If you find yourself needing a Thai visa and you want it to be effortless and all but guaranteed to be approved, head to Vientiane and look for the shop that is directly next to the entrance to the Thai consulate. They will likely approach you if you try to walk by. If you have $33 to spare and would much rather have a stress-free time while visiting the country - for me, it is totally worth it because now i can take a nap for a few hours and then get some beers :) .