The Thai government said on Tuesday that it will scrap the recently implemented Test and Go Plan as Omicron variant cases spike worldwide. The Test and Go Plan, which allowed foreign arrivals to skip quarantine, and the Thailand Pass system will be suspended and reevaluated again on January 4.

This raises the question: what about those who already booked their travel plans and were expecting to use the “test and go” system? Well, apparently, they will be allowed to enter so long as they had already booked their travel, quoting further:

All travelers that previously applied for and received the Thailand Pass can still enter the kingdom until January 10 but must report two more PCR negative tests.

Meanwhile, it seems the Thailand Pass system may also be suspended. To quote directly from the ASEAN Now website:

Thailand has suspended its ‘Thailand Pass’ and ‘Test & Go’ schemes due to fears over the Omicron variant of COVID-19. Thailand’s Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-O-Cha has ordered the immediate suspension of new registrations for Thailand Pass and at the same reinstated mandatory quarantine effective immediately. The PM announced on Tuesday afternoon that Test & Go will be put on hold until at least January 4, 2022. The so-called ‘Sandbox’ programs will also be suspended. “After Dec. 21, there will be no new registrations for ‘Test and Go’, only quarantine or Phuket sandbox,” said deputy government spokeswoman Rachada Dhanadirek.

With a “stroke of the pen” the travel situation has reverted back to the status it was at in mid-summer of 2021. This raises the question: will certificates of entry once again be the order of the day when traveling to Thailand? It would appear so, although the situation remains in flux and could change rather rapidly as past events have shown.

Concurrently, many of those wishing to obtain visas to the USA are finding that backlogs are common throughout the Immigration process. Presently, there are very few interview being scheduled at the US Embassy in Bangkok, citing concerns about the pandemic. Furthermore, American tourist visa applications are not processing as quickly as they did in the past due to interviews being scheduled nearly a year out. Even cases that have seen interview are seeing issues as Administrative Processing is delaying a number of cases, sometimes for a prolonged period of time.

Hopefully, the overall situation will improve and we will update this blog as the situation evolves.

Thailand will allow fully vaccinated visitors from low-risk countries to enter the kingdom without quarantine from Nov 1 as a key effort by the government to boost the economy. In a televised broadcast on Monday night, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said he has instructed the Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration (CCSA) and the Public Health Ministry to consider reopening the country to fully vaccinated tourists without quarantine on Nov 1. However, pre-conditions are that international visitors will need to show that they are Covid-free at their time of travel with an RT-PCR test undertaken before they leave their home country, and then have a test in Thailand…

Clearly the government seems intent upon reopening, but there are some who question whether Thailand will actually reopen on the date selected. Some have pointed out that the deadlines remains tentative. As of the time of this writing the regulations regarding entry to Thailand remain as they have been since April of 2021 for the unvaccinated traveling to Thailand by land, while vaccinated travelers coming by air have seen their quarantine period reduced to 7 days and the unvaccinated must now only quarantine 10 days. Meanwhile, there is also discussion about abolishing the certificate of entry in favor of a “Thailand Pass”. To quote again from the Bangkok Post:

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Digital Government Development Agency are developing a new system to replace the certificate of entry (CoE) for Thais and foreigners who wish to enter the country through an airport. Tanee Sangrat, spokesman for the Foreign Affairs Ministry, said on Thursday a new web-based application called the Thailand Pass system, where people can gather information and upload documents, is being developed for the kingdom’s Nov 1 reopening. Mr Tanee said the Thailand Pass will replace the CoE system and facilitate the filing of an immigration form known as the TM6 and a health declaration form known as T8…

Although the new Thailand Pass will replace the certificate of entry, many of the attributes of this new system appear very similar to the COE system and it should be noted that for some travelers a certificate of entry may still be required. The analysis regarding who requires a certificate of entry to be admitted to Thailand and who can use the Thailand Pass will depend upon the specific facts in a given case.

As Thailand appears to be easing restrictions associated with inbound travel, backlogs in the American immigration system persist. Presently, it is taking an extremely long time, compared to times past, to secure an appointment for an American tourist visa interview. Concurrently, those seeking a K-1 visa or a K-3 visa for a Thai fiancee or spouse to travel to the USA are seeing interview appointments allocated with a decreasing frequency. Furthermore, appointments being issued through the National Visa Center for CR-1 visas and IR-1 visas for immigrant spouses are also increasingly scarce. Hopefully, these delays are temporary and we will see speedier processing of these cases sooner rather than later.