About this site

Who writes this

Affairs In Order Thailand is written and published by Greg Berryman, a long-term foreign resident of Phuket, trading as an Australian sole trader under Australian Business Number (ABN) 83 951 623 827.

I am not a lawyer, in Thailand or anywhere else. What I have is years of living inside this system, and the habit of checking a claim against its source rather than repeating what other sites say about it.

Who it is written for

Foreign residents of Thailand and their partners, and the people who have to deal with a death when one happens. Nothing here assumes anything about your sex, your partner's, which of you is Thai, or whether you are married.

Thai law asks one question about a couple: is the marriage registered. Since 23 January 2025 that question has had the same answer for same-sex couples as for everyone else. Nationality and sex do not affect legal standing. They affect which practical problems fall on which person, and where they differ, the pages say so.

What is free and what is not

The pages are free. There are two things to buy, and neither of them is on a page.

The guide is for planning, and it is written for people living in Thailand. An asset and document inventory, the next of kin authorisation letter in the wording the embassies ask for, and separate modules for British, American, Australian, Canadian, New Zealand and Irish nationals whose governments define next of kin differently. It puts the documents and the details in one place in advance, so the people around you are not assembling them for the first time under pressure.

After a Death in Thailand is for a death that has already happened, and it is written for whoever is dealing with it, here or from another country. A printable working pack: the sequence ordered by the clock, a call sheet, a record log, the authorisation letter, a one page brief to hand a funeral director, and a decision sheet for cremation here or repatriation home.

Neither is legal advice, a will, or a document that gives anyone a legal right Thai law withholds. Neither is a service. Nobody makes calls, contacts authorities or acts on your behalf.

Where this site stands on Thai law

Thai legal review is under way and not finished.

Everything describing embassy or consular procedure comes from the governments themselves and links out. Everything describing Thai law is cited to the Act and the section number, in the body text where you meet the claim, so you can find the provision rather than take my word for what it says. Where a question is unresolved, the page says so. The commercially sold medical power of attorney, discussed on power of attorney in Thailand, is the clearest example. Nobody has confirmed whether it works.

When the review is complete, the reviewer is credited by name, with a date, on a line of its own beneath the author line, so you can see who did what. Where it changes anything material, the page changes and the date changes with it.

What I will not do

Apply any of this to your circumstances. Not by email, not by phone, not in person. Advice on one person's facts is what a lawyer is for, and I am not one. It is also the only way a site like this stays accurate: the time goes into checking what is published or into answering individual mail, and it cannot go into both.

If you need someone to look at your situation, you need a Thai lawyer. A professionally drafted Thai will costs less than most people expect.

How it is sourced

Every page carries its own Sources section listing what that page rests on. The material falls into three classes, and the pages distinguish between them.

  • Primary government sources. Where this site describes embassy or consular procedure, it comes from the governments themselves and links out.
  • Thai legislation, cited by Act and section number. Thai statutes are dated in the Buddhist Era, which runs 543 years ahead of the Western calendar, so the Civil Registration Act B.E. 2534 is the Act of 1991. There is no official English text of any Thai statute. Only the Thai text as published in the Royal Gazette has legal force, which is why the review noted above matters. Where the Thai original is published online, the page links to it.
  • Law firm commentary, used only for practical timescales and procedure that no government publishes. Where a figure comes from this class rather than from statute or a government page, the Sources section says so and the figure is given as a range.

Where sources disagree, the page says so.

Some of what is here was answered directly by a consular section rather than published anywhere, and those answers are labelled as such, dated, and marked as not published by that government. They are not the same as a page you can point at.

What the site claims, and what it does not

Nothing is stated beyond what its source supports. Every claim names its source and carries the date it was checked, so you can go to that source yourself and disagree with what I have made of it. Where a question is open, the page says it is open rather than guessing at the answer.

That is a standard of method. It is not a guarantee that every line is correct. Law changes, government pages are rewritten without notice, practice differs between provinces and between hospitals, and one person working alone will get things wrong.

So if you find something that is wrong, out of date, badly explained or missing, send it. Corrections and suggestions are both welcome, and neither needs to be polite. Say which page, and what you think the answer is. If you have a source, that is better still, and it will be credited on the page if it is used.

The government sources used across this site

What this site does not do

  • It does not give legal advice. This is general information. Your circumstances are specific and I do not know them.
  • It does not replace a Thai will.
  • It does not claim a document can give an unmarried partner rights that Thai law withholds.
  • It does not publish prices that will age. Where costs matter, it points at a government page that someone else keeps current.
  • It does not link to competitors' translations of Thai law. Where no official or institutional source exists online, the Act and section number are given instead so you can look the provision up yourself.

Corrections

Email the page and what is wrong with it, or what you think is missing from it. Corrections are made on the page itself and the review date updated.

greg@inorderthailand.com