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Suvarnabhumi » Etiquette training for immigration officers at the new Bangkok Airport

Tuesday, September 4th, 2007



1,200 immigration officers at Bangkok’s Suvanarbhumi International Airport will take a training course on personality development following complaints from foreign visitors to the Immigration Bureau that they were always frowning and unfriendly, according to a senior Immigration Bureau official.

National Airport Immigration Division Commissioner, Pol. Maj-Gen. Chakthip Chaijinda Monday signed a cooperation agreement with Suan Dusit Rajabhat University on a behavioural modification training course.

Under the terms of the agreement, Gen. Chakthip said, Suan Dusit Rajabhat University will prepare a personality development training course for immigration officers called the “Sawasdee Project.”

The project was initiated after about 30 per cent of visitors at Suvarnabhumi complained that immigration officers at the airport did their duty without smiling and looked unfriendly. Moreover, both arriving and departing passengers complained about the slow immigration documentation procedures, Gen. Chakthip said.

With the cooperation with Suan Dusit Rajabhat University, immigration officers will be trained to use Thai traditional culture to treat visitors, including the Thai traditional ways of greetings - the wai, greeting visitors with the word “Sawasdee” and saying thank you after the procedure is completed.

After the training, he hoped, the visitors would be impressed with the new look of the officials and it can eventually create a good image and positive attitudes among foreign visitors.

However, Gen. Chakthip, stressed that the officers would strictly carry out their duties in immigration procedure.

He added the the Immigration Bureau planned to expand the “Sawasdee Project” to include Thailand’s international airports in Chiang Mai, Phuket, Koh Samui, and Surat Thani province, as well as Hat Yai in Songkhla province, and expected the project would satisfy the visitors to the new Bangkok Airport and Thailand.

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4 Responses to “Etiquette training for immigration officers at the new Bangkok Airport”

  1. Andrew Cox Says:
    January 27th, 2007 at 7:57 am
  2. kwpsoft Says:
    February 3rd, 2007 at 5:36 am

    I fully agree with those comments on immigration officials, I travel mainly in the PR. of China now, immigration as well as customs are sometimes extremely kind, at least they repeat a smile or a greeting with the same. And then those girsls and boys at Thai immigration…………. terrible, no smile, no sign of welcome, they generally give the impression that they are a bunch of jailbirds awaiting their capital punishment

  3. outrigger00 Says:
    March 14th, 2007 at 12:51 pm

    I feel this training has been needed for a long time. In addition, the entire immigration department needs reviewing.
    Last month, my girlfriend and I were flying from Bangkok to Bahrain. The immigration folks had a group of girls held up, asking them the same questions over and over.
    My girlfriend was detained for an hour. The group of girls started to make enough of a disturbance, that the Thai police finally showed up and helped resolve this ’shake-down’. During my girlfriends delay, she remained polite and courtesous throughout her ordeal. The Thai police asked her two questions, looked at her passport and round-trip ticket and processed her through immediately.
    Several of the girls stated that the immigration men wanted 7,000 - 10,000 baht to let the girls through.
    I’m not sure what policy that falls under, but I doubt it’s legality.
    International law and thai law state that immigration can not prevent a person from leaving the country, let alone charge them 7000 baht.
    Let’s hope this training also brings some professionalism and stops the back-country mafia mentality.

  4. leevirginia Says:
    April 17th, 2007 at 2:15 pm

    I may not be going with the popular vote, but I strongly disagree. I find the idea of “sensitivity training” for officers as waste of time and the idea of requiring them to “Wai” and woo visitors as laughable. Why don’t we ask them to pick our nose for us also?

    From what I have researched, these officers are highly trained members of the Thai Royal Police whom often work grueling shifts starting at 5 in the evening to 9 the next morning and processing between 400-800 passports per shift. They people are also responsible for protecting the boarders of their home nation.

    I travel to Thailand for business 3-4 times per year and I have not been warmly greeted by immigration myself, but it really is not their job to greet me. I think the lines are long enough as they are, for them to waste another minute or two on every passenger in front of me to welcome them would not please me at all….maybe we can just have two or three lines where immigration officers give everyone a big, warm welcome and see how many people are so desperate for attention that they are willing to wait an extra 10 or 15 minutes in the welcome lines. No thank you, I have better things to do with my time.

    I think we should all collectively be most highly embarrassed by these suggestions. These Thai people are so warm and open minded, that we all go there and live like kings for the price of a sandwich while these wonderful people try to make a living and cry like a bunch of babies when the entire government does not stand in line to kiss our bottoms.

    So, if you would like some ideas for a warm welcome, here are a few:

    1. Go see one of the nice tour operators right in the airport. These ladies and gentlemen are dressed in traditional Thai clothes and will Wai and woo you all day long.

    2. Stay at a nicer hotel, I have always been greeted warmly by the staff at a good hotel.

    I can go on and on, but the point is, if you want to go to Thailand and live on 200 Baht a day whilst you pee all over their country (it not YOUR country, right? What do you care?), don’t expect to be treated like a long lost relative.

    Grow up. Allow these fine people some dignity and the right to protect their boarders. If they ever showed up at our boarders drunk, belligerent or without a Visa in hand, we would send them back on the next plane, are we any better…? I don’t think so.

    Let these people do their job and stop crying.

    I say NO to this idea of sensitivity training for Thai Immigration.

    -Lee
    Virginia U.S.A.

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