The Royal Thai Police Immigration Bureau has warned that fake visa extension stamps have been found in the passports of foreign visitors departing Thailand Police Lieutenant General Sakda Chuenpakdee, the Commissioner of The Royal Thai Police Immigration Bureau, has through Police Colonel Voravat Amornvivat, Deputy Commander of Investigations, has requested that the following warning be provided to all foreigners in Thailand: “Recently Immigration has found a number of passports with fake rubber stamps, as people are departing from the Kingdom.
Please be aware that there are agents and people who have sold fake visa extension stamps to unsuspecting foreigners. Please be careful when applying through a visa extension agent, that the agent shows you an official receipt of 1,900 from Immigration, for your extension.” However the validity of an offered ‘official receipt’ may also be in question. This is not the first time warnings have been issued about this ‘scam’.
Going back as far as 2003, an official from the consular section of Sweden’s embassy in Bangkok said; “handle all visa extensions by yourself,” after seeing three cases of false visa stamps at the Embassy. It is suggested that anyone who is uncertain about the validity of a stamp in their passport or validity of an immigration receipt after dealing with immigration agents go to the Hua Hin Immigration Office with their concerns. The example below is of a genuine extension stamp.
