Types Of Visa In Thailand

There are several types of non-diplomatic Thai visas that the Thailand Embassy and the Consulate can issue. It could get confusing for first timers due to minor variations, though. So, these are very generic types of visas. You will need to continue your research to understand more about the type of Thai visa you seek.

• Tourist visa for Thailand

If you are a resident from the list of 48 countries that can avail tourist visa exemption, you can enter Thailand without tourist visa for 30 days. But you must carry 10,000 Baht per person or 20,000 Baht per family as proof of sufficient finances for the duration of the stay. Residents from the rest of the countries can acquire tourist visa via Thai embassy or consulate.

• Business visa for Thailand

This is the toughest via to get. Royal Thai embassy or consulate wants to ensure that these services are not otherwise available in the country before they offer Work visa. The Business visa for business or investment purposes requires proof of business and investment activities.

• Transit visa for Thailand

This is very similar to Thailand tourist visa. Most nationals won’t need it, if you are qualified for a visa waiver.

• Non immigrant visa for education

The easiest way to get this kind education visa for Thailand is to show a letter of acceptance from any reputed Thai college or school. You will also need to get familiar with the local language and the long term stay of this kind would necessitate that. With the right supporting documents, Thai education visa is easy.

• Non immigrant visa for medical care

Medical tourism is highly lucrative and expanding industry. Thailand is a very rewarding destination for these trips for three reasons:

o Thailand has high standard medical treatment centres that follow international standards of medical treatment and post-treatment care.

o Thai tourism is most friendly and hospitable towards medical tourists. The specialist travel agencies offer the best of their services to these tourists. Thai spa is one of the best services in such packages that would offer much greater relief to the medical travellers.

o Thai visa processes are much less stringent and welcoming, which allows easy visa processing and quick gateway to Thailand.

• Other non-immigrant visas

There are a lot of different visas that you need to acquire to stay in Thailand for very specific purposes. Do you want to retire in Thailand? That’s great choice. B u, you need to get specific visa for it. How about getting married to Thai national? You would need to submit that marriage certificate and other details to acquire the visa that would allow you to continue to stay in this country. You are a journalist, who is doing a story on Thailand? You need visa for that.

What Is Document Attestation?

While applying for a new passport or renewing an old one, all citizens are required to provide a list of documents for perusal. While the requirements for the same may vary from country to country, by and large, the list includes a proof of address, proof of date of birth as well as a document to prove citizenship. These documents, once submitted, have to be verified, and the process is called Document Attestation.

The Document Attestation Process involves authenticating or legalising the submitted documents by respective embassies and is a process most often followed when applying for a visa to different countries. Apart from these required documents, embassies also accept document attestation for other necessities like education degrees, marriage certificates, any kind of diploma, police clearance certificates and so on.

As part of the document attestation process in countries like India, there are, by and large, three types of attestations:

State Attestation: different kind of documents will require different kind of state authorities to attest the same. For example, in case of an educational document, the State Education Department will be required to validate the document. In case of a personal document, however, different departments will be called to verify the same.

Ministry of External Affairs Attestation: MEA attestation is a document attestation process that normally follows state-level document attestation. For the most part, three kinds of documents get attested: Educational, Non-educational and commercial documents.

Embassy Attestation: After state-level and MEA-level attestation is completed, various embassies will also be called upon for document attestation. While this process may seem a bit tedious, many consulates and embassies also outsource their services to visa and consulate service firms. These firms will help you not only run through the document attestation process, but also help with document scanning service, and in many cases, also offer to help you digitize and protect your hard copies.

This document scanning service is invaluable when it comes to safety, as it helps to safeguard your documents, do away with the worry of damage and can be retrieved very easily. These firms also help to make the process of document attestation relatively painless, as many offer to take up the entire process for a certain fee and promise to deliver in a fixed time frame. It is important to check whether these firms work in tandem with the embassy that you wish to apply for a visa with and the kind of fees that the same charge for.

How to save tax with mutual funds

As February approaches, most of us start looking for tax-saving solutions. Tax saving mutual funds can be efficient investment avenues that may help reduce your tax burden and at the same time increase your wealth.

In an endeavor to cut down the tax liability by as much as possible, a number of us end-up making hasty investment decisions, typically with long-term repercussions. This is true for most of us. We tend to our tax-saving investment choices for the last few weeks. However, it’s imperative that one carefully plans and executes his or her investments well ahead.

While it’s vital to possess adequate information concerning the various tax-saving provisions under the income tax Act, it’s also critical to find out about the main tax saving instruments that allow you benefit from these provision.

ELSS Funds

ELSS – An Ideal Tax saver- Equity Linked Savings Schemes (ELSS) offers a simple option to obtain tax benefits and a chance to harness the potential upside of investing within the equity market. The primary objective of the scheme is to generate long-term capital appreciation from a portfolio that is invested predominantly in equities along with income tax benefit.

Since it’s an equity fund, the returns from this scheme are market determined. Over a longer period of time ELSS funds deliver higher returns with tax-efficiency. It has also been observed that these funds tend to outperform other classes where returns are concerned.

Features of ELSS Funds

Tax-saving
Three-year locks-in period. This encourages long term investment among investors and also gives them enough time to manage their portfolios of stocks.
Can be held even after the completion of 3 years
Offers dividend as well as growth options
Option of starting with investing small amounts of as low as Rs. 500 a month.
Tax Treatment of ELSS Funds

The returns from an ELSS fund are tax free in your hands. The long run capital gains from an ELSS are tax free as well. This is as a result of no tax is levied on equities that are held for over a year. Since an ELSS falls under section 80C, you’ll be able to claim around Rs. 1, 00,000 from your investment as a deduction from your gross total income.