immigration in BKK
 

Flying from from Tokyo to Cebu with connection in BKK with a different airline/ticket, do I need to pass thru immigration in BKK?

There have been a few queries about this recently and we had confirmation in late Jan that all transfer counters at BKK are closed, see this post.

The Thai Civil Aviation Authority also states that transit is only permitted on a single PNR/Ticket unless you can assure yourself that you will be checked through from your origin including getting a boarding pass... You can see this by going to CAAT and clicking the link for download on point 1.6 in the table, and the guidelines for international flights PDF and read the text for point 10, you will also need a RT-PCR test to board the flight from your origin. Also note point 11 in this PDF and that it's quite difficult for you to know if your flight operator is licenced for transit operations, as they won't have any prior knowledge of your intentions to transit to Cebu they are unlikely to be authorised.

To be honest attempting to do self-connect journeys at the moment is very troublesome, especially to countries where it's not easy to enter the country.

Your main problem is that the check-in staff for your first flight will struggle to consider you as a transit passenger at the moment, and they have to consider whether you are admissable to your destination as far as they are concerned which is Thailand. If you can't convince your origin to through check you and your luggage you will prove you can enter Thailand you will likely be denied boarding if you can't.

Let us know what you end up doing, good luck!

You will not be permitted to board your flight to BKK as you are not considered a transit passenger by the airline

Piggy-backing off the title- I'm planning to fly into BKK early morning- 6am-ish, is it safe to assume immigration lines are 'normal'? What times of day are the most busy for the immigration officers at BKK? Assuming I land around 6am, does anyone know approximately how long it would take to clear immigration?

I have flown into BKK twice in the last 3 weeks. It has been faster than normal both times. They do ask for the boarding card though on arrival at immigration. Obviously now you do not have to fill any immigration landing cards at all.

early morning is very busy as then a lot of flights from Europe and some red eyes from India and other parts of Asia arrive...it is very quiet until around 0530 and then one after the other arrives and queues are getting longer pretty fast...
so the first ones, who arrive take just 5-10 minutes and half an hour later, you can queue up to an hour....unless you are entitled to fast track

Welcome to FlyerTalk augustus steranko !!

My experience is the same as BinSabai indicated above. Early morning arrivals are dependent on when your plane arrives in the mix of all the other arrivals coming in during this busy time. Last month I arrive on the TG flight from MUC and was thru immigration in under 5 minutes.

I have found that overall the lines move pretty fast when compared to before, so regardless it will not be awful. Also be aware of other immigration points that may be open and have less of a line. A walk of 100 meters could save you a lot of time.

Just arrived back home to BKK this afternoon around 5:15pm, and the foreign passport queues towards C gates looked pretty packed. Zero queue for fast track (and e-gates for Thai passport holders) though and we walked straight to open counters.

Thanks for the information all, it is very helpful. I'll likely be on a TG flight from India. I'll be with my elderly parents - we are all U.S. passport holders- so I just wanted to make sure the wait wouldn't be too taxing on them if they had to stand for prolonged periods.

Over 70s can use Priority Lane. I expect you can accompany parents to use this Lane. You may check if normal lanes may be quicker which partly depends on time of day and which Immigration is closest to where you leave the plane or travel a few mins on a bus.

beside the mentioned fast lane for everybody over 70 you could also book wheelchair service which most airlines incl. TG provide free of charge...

I do not want to "like" this, as there are soooooo many exceptions to the fast track eligibility :) But luckily, not many people know!

So many exceptions, and not including the many people who don't qualify who use the fast track lanes.:(

I'll not share beyond this thread ;), thank you all for the insights, this is great and very much appreciated.

Couldn't find a thread with this, so putting here...

I'm arriving at BKK 05-DEC on a one-way ticket from Haneda (HND) on ANA (NH).
Departing BKK 12-DEC on a one way ticket Thai Airways to Frankfurt, on to USA on United.
Separate tickets.
US Citizen, so exempt from Visa.

Will I need anything in immigration to show outbound trip booked and dates?

Thank you!