126 replies to this topic
Posted 2011-06-29 10:41:55
 digital, on 2011-06-15 16:01:19, said:
Here is what has happened for me so far if its of any use to anybody:
14 May: Transfer payment to bank account
19 May: I sent completed application forms which was sent to me by mail, passport copies, education certificate copies, 7 photo's.
20 May Documents I sent EMS arrived with OLA.
1 June: OLA email me to say they have the documents ready now and send back same day registered post.
8 June: Documents arrived to my address
....In English: Class enrollment form confirmation, Letter of accepting admission.
....In Thai: letter requesting Visa, original & copy of MOE approval letter, 6 page document that looks like the schools registration, copy of house registration, copy of ID card.
I've always had quick replies to my emails (except for 1 which was next day), sent 4 mails before payments and more during and after.
I am going to KL end of the month to obtain my Ed-Visa. They said to me they have more than 30 student now in Phuket and Krabi and guarantee 1000% there is no problem for visa and 3 month extensions. (I asked about Phuket because this is where I will go for extensions)
There is 1 hour per week of live Skype lessons and they will send lessons every week ( I took this to mean 1 hour of taught lessons per week plus the rest self study, there is something on the website about daily quizzes and tests + video chat room for practice with other students).
Since I signed up they now seem to have some arrangement with island tefl who now seem to be handling the appliactions/marketing (think??)
School started in 2532 (1989?) I think from trying to understand the documents.
I am scheduled to start lessons 1st August.
Any more questions I will share what I know, will post back after getting Visa and once lessons start.
Update to say returned from KL last night with single entry Non-Ed Visa issued, no problems, passport already had non-o multiple+ visa runs for almost a year, non-b + extensions based on working and a single tourist visa.
Immigration officer politely asked me what I was studying upon entering Thailand and where I was studying, he seemed friendly so not sure if it was just chat or he was checking up on me? I just said Thai and Bangkok he said ok you get 90 days stamp.
Will report back once lessons start, hope I manage to learn some Thai as I know next to nothing from several years here.
Posted 2011-06-29 16:25:41
Thanks for the update digital and good luck with your studies!
One question for you reading your post again - why is a copy of your house registration required?
I've now been in touch directly with OLA via email and can confirm that they have been speedy and comprehensive with their replies. As digital said above, Skype lessons are once per week (for 1-2 hours), with the balance of the 200 hours made up by self-study. They have students of varying degrees of proficiency and also have an advanced course.
For the record, the school confirmed that the poster above named as Richie White, who seemed to be speaking as an OLA employee, has nothing to do with their school. Or at least nobody with that name is associated with them. I never got a reply from him anyway.
Posted 2011-06-29 18:36:51
TCA, on 2011-06-29 16:25:41, said: ...One question for you reading your post again - why is a copy of your house registration required? ...
When I read that about the house registration I understood that it was part of the documents Digital received form the school, ie copy the house registration and ID of a school director.
digital, on 2011-06-15 16:01:19, said: ...
8 June: Documents arrived to my address
....In English: Class enrollment form confirmation, Letter of accepting admission.
....In Thai: letter requesting Visa, original & copy of MOE approval letter, 6 page document that looks like the schools registration, copy of house registration, copy of ID card.
...
I have a question for Digital, though: was the letter in Thai requesting the visa addressed to a particular Thai consulate, ie did you have to tell the school beforehand at what consulate you will apply and the school then addressed the letter to that consulate?
Posted 2011-06-29 18:45:25
For clarification, I changed the topic title from "OLA Cheap ED visa" to the new title "OLA Cheap Thai language course with ED visa"
Posted 2011-06-30 03:29:43
Seems to be turning into spam for a commercial enterprises
While debate healthy ,touting seems cheap and importuning and demeans the purveyor
As a matter of fact many leading Universities iin US UK etc run online coures
e.g. Open University
Seems like apples and pears tolink sold courses to right to stay
Of course if MacWalen could promise PR to those who pass their so called classes.
Real Thai tuition is available at proper universities like Thammasat Chula ets for bona fide students
If you do not think this a visa scam ,wake up and smell the coffee
22,000 is more than most Thais earn yet they teach their kids to read write and speak .
L2 acquisition has nothing to do with visas
Posted 2011-06-30 10:24:33
Maestro, on 2011-06-29 18:36:51, said:
TCA, on 2011-06-29 16:25:41, said: ...One question for you reading your post again - why is a copy of your house registration required? ...
When I read that about the house registration I understood that it was part of the documents Digital received form the school, ie copy the house registration and ID of a school director.
Yes thats right, copy ot ID card and house registration is somebody at the school not me.
digital, on 2011-06-15 16:01:19, said: ...
8 June: Documents arrived to my address
....In English: Class enrollment form confirmation, Letter of accepting admission.
....In Thai: letter requesting Visa, original & copy of MOE approval letter, 6 page document that looks like the schools registration, copy of house registration, copy of ID card.
...
I have a question for Digital, though: was the letter in Thai requesting the visa addressed to a particular Thai consulate, ie did you have to tell the school beforehand at what consulate you will apply and the school then addressed the letter to that consulate?
I don't think it was addressed to KL Thai Embassy, they did not ask me where I was going but they did know as I asked if there was any problem going to KL.
Posted 2011-07-22 15:35:53
That's great. Thanks for the update Digital.
So how are the classes going?
Posted 2011-07-22 17:59:57
A short history of the ED-visa schools:
1. First people thought you had to study 200 hours per year to get a ED-visa (which is very little, but hey, smart businessmen discovered a new business in this: the "ED-visa school").
2. Then they said it should be only 180 hours and 20 hours home work. (homework is also studying, smart thinking).
3. Then they changed hours to lessons, so they called it 180 lessons - and a lesson is only 50 minutes. (Great idea!).
4. After that they introduced online studying via Skype (I never understood why would you need a visa for that. You can do that from within your home country).
5. In the next step the students were not required to come to the courses anymore. In fact, a huge percentage of the students almost never shows up for the courses but the schools still give them the paperwork to do the 90-day extensions. (Any student of a "ED-visa school" will confirm this -- Isn't that wonderful?)
6. And now in the next step they call it online assistance, and there's no teacher involved anymore and you pay only half of what you paid before! So only 12500B for access to one website (Isn't that cheap!).
And now a little preview of the future:
7. the last step: the end of the ED-visa
The website (pasathaionline.com) is registered to:
OLAINTERNATIONAL
Phongsin Sinpibarn (olainter@gmail.com)
1895/39-40 37/1 soi Phahonyothin Rd
Chatu Church
Bangkok,10220
TH
Tel. +66.0870242772
OLAINTER.AC.TH was registered in november 2010. The school is supposed to be 20 years old.
This is the manager:
http://www.facebook....100000160933451
He studied in Australia, so if you call the number above he should be able to answer you questions in English.
Edited by kriswillems, 2011-07-22 18:27:48.
Posted 2011-07-23 01:01:32
Hello everyone,
After carefully reading this thread, i got in touch with the school. Got a rather quick reply, with a 72-hours promotion offer of 12,500.
Indeed, as kriswillems was saying, one big consideration seems to be the fact, that one does NOT need an Ed-visa to study online. I am puzzled as to how the Immigration would accept and permit such an arrangement...
What do you think?
Posted 2011-07-23 12:06:10
netineti, on 2011-07-23 01:01:32, said:
Indeed, as kriswillems was saying, one big consideration seems to be the fact, that one does NOT need an Ed-visa to study online. I am puzzled as to how the Immigration would accept and permit such an arrangement...
What do you think?
You don't need a visa to study Thai by attending classes in person either. The fact is that study at the OLA school under an ED visa is authorised by the Ministry of Education, be it online or otherwise, so the visas seem to be issued easily enough. Whether the online part is conveniently omitted from the documentation, I don't know. The question for me would be with regard to visa extensions, assuming you try for the next 90 days in a different province to where the school is based. I could see Immigration officers potentially raising an eyebrow at that. As we know, unfortunately Immigration are a law unto themselves at times, so what happens in one location won't necessarily be the same in another place. Hopefully poster digital and some others will post their experiences here though.
Edited by TCA, 2011-07-23 12:10:11.
Posted 2011-07-23 19:36:35
netineti, on 2011-07-23 01:01:32, said:
Hello everyone,
After carefully reading this thread, i got in touch with the school. Got a rather quick reply, with a 72-hours promotion offer of 12,500.
Indeed, as kriswillems was saying, one big consideration seems to be the fact, that one does NOT need an Ed-visa to study online. I am puzzled as to how the Immigration would accept and permit such an arrangement...
What do you think?
Doesn't the website say you get 200 hours for that price?
http://olainter.ac.th/Course_Fees.html
It says when you apply within 72 hours, you get 200 hours for 12,500B instead of 15000B.
But what do hours mean? Time you can look at a website? Or time you can spend with a real teacher?
Posted 2011-07-24 12:23:40
kriswillems, on 2011-07-23 19:36:35, said:
It says when you apply within 72 hours, you get 200 hours for 12,500B instead of 15000B.
But what do hours mean? Time you can look at a website? Or time you can spend with a real teacher?
I've exchanged emails with them and the "online class with teacher" part of the course is up to a couple of hours per week, depending on the student's level or what they feel comfortable with as a beginner. This is the exact response:
"Class is online once per week and the duration is 1-2 hours each time. If you worked with an average of 1.5 hours per week that would be 78 hours per year actually online and 122 hours of self study offline"
Posted 2011-07-26 10:40:13
Hello digital, and all,
Do you have any news about the school? Anybody else joined it?
Please kindly keep updating 
Thanks!
Posted 2011-07-26 12:32:24
netineti, on 2011-07-26 10:40:13, said:
Hello digital, and all,
Do you have any news about the school? Anybody else joined it?
Please kindly keep updating
Thanks!
re read the thread, someone DID join and updated
Posted 2011-07-27 11:28:58
aneliane, on 2011-07-26 12:32:24, said:
netineti, on 2011-07-26 10:40:13, said:
Hello digital, and all,
Do you have any news about the school? Anybody else joined it?
Please kindly keep updating
Thanks!
re read the thread, someone DID join and updated
:-)
I was following the thread, and we all DID hear about digital's joining, but not about how his classes are going. Also, i meant if there is somebody ELSE who joined.
As of me, i wrote them another message last Friday, boldly asking how they manage to give Ed visas for Online course, however, not a peep from them so far.
Posted 2011-09-01 12:21:05
Thought I'd bump this message as I'm interested to see if any new OLA students have anything to report on getting their ED visas and/or the OLA classes.
Anybody?
reallyhappy
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Posted 2011-09-07 02:32:04
TCA, on 2011-09-01 12:21:05, said:
Thought I'd bump this message as I'm interested to see if any new OLA students have anything to report on getting their ED visas and/or the OLA classes.
Anybody?
Edited by reallyhappy, 2011-09-07 02:51:50.
Posted 2011-09-07 10:39:15
reallyhappy, on 2011-09-07 02:32:04, said:
TCA, on 2011-09-01 12:21:05, said:
Thought I'd bump this message as I'm interested to see if any new OLA students have anything to report on getting their ED visas and/or the OLA classes.
Anybody?
Well, at least you have the multi entry visa.
Edited by Semper, 2011-09-07 10:39:59.
Posted 2011-09-07 11:19:15
Semper, on 2011-09-07 10:39:15, said:
Well, at least you have the multi entry visa.
This is the huge benefit to getting a multiple entry in these circumstances. Even if all is well with the school, for online students with single entry visas not living anywhere near the actual school I'd still foresee problems at immigration getting 90 days extensions for a school in a different province.
I doubt very much whether a multiple entry visa will get a second glance on re-entering Thailand every 90 days, but of course you never know. Multiple entry visas don't suit everyone but I wouldn't like to be in the shoes of those above with single entry ED visas if the school has gone AWOL.
Posted 2011-09-13 14:23:41
Just a quick update people.
I finally decided to go with OLA and the owner was very friendly (and spoke good English). I received all the relevant paperwork off them a few days ago and have now booked a flight to KL to get the visa.
Posted 2011-09-13 16:07:44
jonboy, on 2011-09-13 14:23:41, said:
Just a quick update people.
I finally decided to go with OLA and the owner was very friendly (and spoke good English). I received all the relevant paperwork off them a few days ago and have now booked a flight to KL to get the visa.
jonboy, as long as you're not bothered about actually getting any tuition, then you should be OK! 
I trust you saw the post below from less than a week ago:
reallyhappy, on 2011-09-07 02:32:04, said:
I have been in Phuket around 3 weeks now. myself and about 3/4 others were due to start class on the 1st September however we have all sent emails to OLA and nobody has had a reply/any contact in a week!!!
Posted 2011-09-13 16:58:24
TCA, on 2011-09-13 16:07:44, said:
jonboy, on 2011-09-13 14:23:41, said:
Just a quick update people.
I finally decided to go with OLA and the owner was very friendly (and spoke good English). I received all the relevant paperwork off them a few days ago and have now booked a flight to KL to get the visa.
jonboy, as long as you're not bothered about actually getting any tuition, then you should be OK!
I trust you saw the post below from less than a week ago:
reallyhappy, on 2011-09-07 02:32:04, said:
I have been in Phuket around 3 weeks now. myself and about 3/4 others were due to start class on the 1st September however we have all sent emails to OLA and nobody has had a reply/any contact in a week!!!
Lol
Actually I have always gotten replies very fast off them. I think most peoples email problems are when they send the emails via their website. I spoke to the receptionist on the phone and she actualyy was useless.Probably best to chat to the owner direct like I did. He picks up straight away or gets back to me within 30 minutes.
If I only get a visa out of it then it has served its main purpose. But I expect I will get more but who knows until then.
Posted 2011-09-13 19:44:47
A Thai business failing to reply to emails promptly - or at all? Pull the other one.
Posted 2011-09-29 17:23:48
Just an update for you all.
I got a non imm ED visa without any problems from Kuala Lumpur using the OLA school.
Cost at KL was 220 Ringgit.
Have just sent them an email asking about my first Thai lesson. Let's see if there is one
Posted 2011-09-29 17:38:50
it will intersting to see on how the 3 month extension will go through.
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