...according to Pol.Lt.Gen. Nathathorn Prousoontorn
Commissioner at the Thai Immigration Bureau
Your ears are your proof of identification
Visitors entering the kingdom will be put through a number of screening procedures. We first verify the passport. Then, we examine the person standing in front of us to make sure he or she is the same person as in the photograph shown in the passport. It might happen that people present an official passport yet with a photo of a person with similar facial features—identical twins, for example. So it’s important, when cross-checking between the passport photo and the person, to look at the person’s ears Everyone’s ears are unique that even twins’ ears are not identical. Plastic surgery may change the shape of the ear but it won’t be able to alter the ears’ position—and the same goes for the lips and the iris of the eye. When in doubt [during the passport checking], the passport will be verified in a laboratory, which is available at every airport in Thailand.
The blacklist does exist, and is highly regarded
When you arrive at the immigration checkpoint, it’s actually the second time you are being filtered. You’re first verified when you check in at the airport of your departure. There is a “blacklist” [shared with airports around the world] and if your name is on it, airline staff won’t process your boarding pass—and you, of course, won’t be able to get on the plane. This process is called the Advance Passenger Processing System (APPS).
Sereechai Puttes
Where is your visa?
Some visitors don’t apply for an entry visa to Thailand at their country of departure. When they arrive at Suvarnabhumi airport, they say they’re transfer passengers en route to another country, but, in fact, they want to enter Thailand. They wander around the airport for a week or two. We often catch these kinds of passengers. So, we’ve set up a team to monitor people who seem to be intentionally staying inside the airport for longer than 12 hours. If they can’t present either a visa to enter Thailand or a boarding pass to their next destination, they will be immediately deported to where they came from.
More and more people are overstaying their visa
And that’s why the immigration office has launched a new measure to deal with these people. A passenger who’s overstaying no more than 90 days will have to pay a fine of B500 for each day he or she has overstayed in the country. But those who have overstayed their visa for longer than 90 days will be put on another blacklist [not the same as the blacklist mentioned above] and will be banned from re-entering the country for one year.