[Covid] How to get the 90-day STV visa for Thailand?

In this article, I will show you how to get the STV visa and COE to travel to Thailand. This article was written based on information gathered from people who obtained it at the Thai Embassy in Paris in April 2021.

Warning

This article is only for those who want to apply for a STV (Special Tourist Visa).

For those who want to enter without a visa (45-day visa exemption, extendable by 30 days)… the process is slightly different, I’ll cover that in another article.

Some prefer to apply for the STV because it allows you to stay in Thailand for 90 days, and extend that by 2 periods of 90 days, so up to 9 months in Thailand. However, this visa’s extension is much harder than others, and since it will be phased out soon, you can only stay until the end of September 2021, with no possibility of extending afterwards. This visa is more suited for those who own an apartment or house in Thailand.

So, the difficulties of the STV are:

• you must go to the embassy to submit your passport
• you must apply from your home country
• you need to prove accommodation for 3 months after quarantine
• you incur quite a few expenses before you even get the visa

Whereas with the visa exemption, you can do it from abroad, and spend much less money. Returning to France would be non-negotiable for us if we had to apply for the STV.

Use an agency or not?

If you’re used to handling administrative tasks and understand English, it will be easy for you.

What’s the process?

At best, you can have all the paperwork done in 1 week; at worst, in 3 weeks.

• Two weeks earlier:
  • create an account on https://thaievisa.go.th/ to see what documents are required
  • create an account on https://coethailand.mfa.go.th/ to see what documents are required
  • review all quarantine-eligible hotels and choose the best value for money. We recommend using Agoda, an online booking system approved by the government. Use this special ASQ link. The advantage with Agoda is that you can cancel anytime without a deposit, and still get your confirmation paper (issued by the hotel).
  • The quarantine duration depends on your vaccination status, your country of origin, and your hotel check-in time. Coming from France, unvaccinated, you must choose either 11 days, 10 nights (check-in before 6 PM) or 12 days, 11 nights (check-in after 6 PM).
  • select the Thai insurance
  • ask our current international insurance for a certificate covering Covid up to $100,000. Personally, we used Yupwego, and the certificate is obtained in minutes. But Chapka can also issue the same certificate in English.
  • take a photo, scan your passport
  • call the Thai embassy in Paris to ask if the STV is still available (since it’s a special visa, anything can change at any moment)
• One week earlier:
  • book the hotel via Agoda
  • book flexible flight tickets with Air France (we recommend the flight with a stopover in Amsterdam to avoid needing a compelling reason). Until the end of the year, all Air France and KLM tickets are cancellable/modifiable at any time.
  • buy return tickets (less than 90 days, even if you plan to apply for an extension). It’s better to choose a cancellable/modifiable ticket. We chose a direct Bangkok-Paris flight, but others have opted for Turkey, for example.
  • pay for the Thai insurance and get the confirmation (around €500/person). You can check all eligible Thai insurances here: http://longstay.tgia.org/ We contacted AXA, and here’s their offer

• print out bank statements showing a minimum of €6000 across all accounts
• send the plane tickets to the hotel to get the hotel’s written confirmation
• the hotel will send you a “confirmation letter”
• DAY 1: apply for the STV on https://thaievisa.go.th/ with all the documents gathered. At the end of the process, pay the visa fee & request an appointment. Choose “Tourist Visa” as the visa category. They will ask you how many days you plan to stay, and they will understand that you are applying for an STV
• DAY 2 or 3: drop off the passports at the Thai embassy in Paris, with the appointment confirmation obtained on https://thaievisa.go.th/. It takes 3 minutes. Only one person needs to go.
• DAY 3, 4, or 5: pick up the passports with the visa

• DAY 3, 4, or 5: create a file on https://coethailand.mfa.go.th/ with all the requested documents. Choose the following categories:

• Note down the 6 personal digits of the CoE
• DAY 5 or 6: get the COE and note down the CoE code
• One week before arrival: send visa and COE related documents to the hotel
• At least 72 hours before departure: PCR test
• As soon as you get the negative PCR test results: ask the doctor for a paper confirming that you are really negative for PCR
• The day before the trip: download the ThailandPlus app. Prepare the Reference ID = the 6 digits provided when creating the CoE file.
• At the airport, after check-in: enter the 6 digits and the CoE Code in the ThailandPlus app
• D-DAY: fly to Bangkok
• 11/12 days of quarantine depending on your arrival time
• Last day of quarantine: with your quarantine confirmation, you can go anywhere in Thailand that same day

Good luck, the list is long but in reality, two or three days are enough to gather all the necessary documents.

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