Lawful Deportation of Foreign Nationals Due to Lack of a Work Permit

The Working of Alien Act, B.E. 2551 (2008) and the Immigration Act, B.E. 2522 (1979) prohibit foreign nationals with tourist visas from working in the Kingdom of Thailand without a work permit. It appeared that the Plaintiff’s employer was an international firm that could enjoy the benefits of the investment promotion certificate as stated in the Investment Promotion Act, B.E. 2520 (1977) in establishing the affiliated company called Y. (Thailand) Co., Ltd., yet the said company did not apply for permission to bring the Plaintiff who was a foreign national into the country to work for the newly established company in accordance with Section 24 or Section 25 of the aforesaid legislation. Given that the officials of the Defendant No. 4 found out that the Plaintiff entered the country with a tourist visa to work for the said company without a work permit, the Defendant No. 3 issued an order to register the Plaintiff’s name to the internal watchlist database of foreign nationals with previous issues that shall be banned from re-entering the country in accordance with Section 12 paragraph one (3) of the Immigration Act, B.E. 2522 (1979). When the Plaintiff subsequently re-entered the country in October B.E. 2560 (2017) with a tourist visa to work while the said company still had not yet acquired a work permit for the Plaintiff, the Defendant No. 3 lawfully issued an order to the Plaintiff to depart the country. The Plaintiff also had no standing to sue for a revocation of the order that added the Plaintiff’s name to the internal watchlist database since it was not deemed as an ‘administrative order’ that directly affected the Plaintiff’s rights according to the Administrative Procedure Act, B.E. 2539 (1996) but was rather deemed as an internal process of administrative agency in providing relevant information for the immigration officers in exercising their discretion in decision-making to issue an administrative order.