Already found your Thai worker? What Thailand still requires before departure

Finding the worker is not the same as being allowed to take them

A good share of our enquiries start the same way. The employer already has the person: a therapist who worked a season in Europe, a cook recommended by the one already in the kitchen, a candidate found through a Facebook group. What they want from us is the paperwork, and usually they mean the European paperwork.

The European permit is only half of it. Thailand regulates its own side of overseas work closely, through the Employment Arrangement and Jobseeker Protection Act of 1985 and the Department of Employment, and it checks workers at the airport on the way out. A worker with a valid European visa and no Thai registration can be stopped at the labour checkpoint.

There is also a rule aimed at the employer. Section 50 of the act prohibits an employer abroad, or its agent, from recruiting an employee in Thailand, except through the Department of Employment or a licensed recruitment office. Breaking it carries three to ten years in prison or a fine of 60,000 to 200,000 baht. An employer can hire a Thai worker who comes forward. An employer cannot run its own recruitment drive in Thailand.

The five legal ways out of Thailand

Thai official sources name five legal routes to work abroad. Through a recruitment agency licensed by the Department of Employment. Through the Department itself, in government-to-government programmes. On the worker's own arrangement, with notice to the Department. Sent by a Thai employer to work for it abroad, with the Department's permission. And sent by a Thai employer for training abroad. A worker returning to the same job abroad notifies the Department as well.

For a European employer with a named candidate, only two of these fit. The worker can travel on their own arrangement, or a licensed agency can take the named worker through its own licence. The other three belong to the Thai state or to Thai companies.

Route one: the worker travels on their own notification

Under section 48 a jobseeker who arranges a job abroad without a licensed agency has to notify the Department of Employment at least fifteen days before the trip. The Department's handbook lists what goes with the notification: identity documents, the passport, proof of contact with the employer, the document allowing entry to work in the destination country, and a copy of the employment contract certified by the Thai labour office or embassy responsible for that country.

That certification is the step European employers do not expect. Thailand has no labour office in most of Europe, so the Royal Thai Embassy or Consulate-General does it. The chain usually runs through a notary and a national authority first. The embassies in Athens and Helsinki and the Consulate-General in Frankfurt each charge 15 euros per certified document, Frankfurt asks for a set of four copies, two in German and two in Thai, for 60 euros, and Athens states five business days for a complete file. The embassies describe it as a condition for the Thai approval, and Helsinki reserves the right to refuse a contract.

On departure the worker passes the Department's checkpoint at the airport. Skipping the notification is a fine of up to 5,000 baht, but the larger risk is practical: the Department reserves the right to deny departure, and checkpoints do stop workers who leave without registration. A self-arranged worker is also outside the protection fund for workers abroad unless they pay into it before leaving.

After arrival the act asks the worker to report to the Thai labour office or embassy within fifteen days. Some embassies add their own step: Prague asks the employer to present the worker for registration within thirty days.

Route two: a licensed agency takes the named worker through

The second route is the one we offer. You keep your candidate. We take them through our own licence, number Tor.1250/2565, as a placement we arrange, so the file goes to the Department of Employment as an agency job order rather than a private notification.

Under the agency route the documents from your side are fewer. The Department's manual for employers asks for a power of attorney, a demand letter and a company certificate, certified by the Thai embassy or consulate responsible for your country. The worker then goes through the medical examination at a hospital the Department lists, the pre-departure orientation the Department requires of every worker going abroad, the payment into the protection fund and the airport checkpoint, with us arranging each step.

The European permit runs in parallel and does not change: the type A permit in Poland, the Employee Card in Czechia, the single permit in Croatia. What changes is that the Thai side is registered, the worker leaves without a problem at the airport, and if anything goes wrong abroad the worker is inside the system the Thai state uses to help its workers.

There is one thing this route will not do. It will not make a candidate the European rules would refuse acceptable. If the person you found does not meet the qualification, pay or quota conditions of your country, we will say so before anything is filed.

What it costs, and who pays

The Thai state charges little. The protection fund contribution for a worker going to Europe has been 500 baht, and in May 2025 the Cabinet approved in principle a single rate of 1,000 baht for every destination. The fund pays for a stranded worker's trip home, medical costs, legal fees and help to the family if the worker dies abroad. Contract certification in Europe is around 15 euros a document.

The larger question is who carries the cost. Under the employer-pays standard we work to, the worker pays nothing for being placed: not our service, not the certification, not the fund, not the flight. That is a commitment we price into our fee to the employer, and it is also the position the ILO takes in its general principles on fair recruitment.

If you would rather the worker went on their own notification, that is lawful and you do not need us. Make sure the contract is certified before the flight is booked, that the notification goes in fifteen days ahead, and that the worker understands the fund cover is voluntary on that route.