Visa Overstay

I have a friend who has been living illegally in Hong Kong. They now wish to voluntarily return to their home country. (Thailand)


What are the legal ramifications? Will they face a jail term, if they volunteer to leave and have a one way ticket?

How long have they overstayed?

They have overstayed at least 3 years, maybe 4.

yup a spell in jail could well be on the cards.

So make sure it's a re-schedulable ticket, among other things.

An update for anyone interested:


After several months research and speaking to various people, including, Lawyers, Immigration Department and the Thailand Consulate, Opinion was divided. Around 70% that there should be no jail time served, but some sort of punishment would be meted out, most likely a stiff fine.


First trip to the ID, with an open one ticket, resulted in details being recorded, passport retained and ID card photocopied.


Second trip to ID, resulted in a several hour grilling by a dragon lady and my friend accused of lying and attempting to subvert the system. Told to report back to ID, to pay a "bond".


Third trip resulted in a HK$100 "bond" and a date to appear in court.


Court appearance resulted in an 18 months jail term, suspended for two years. The friend was given two weeks to leave Hong Kong and the passport marked with a stamp that says "Not valid for entry to HK SAR, for a period of two years from "dated".


So the end result was pretty much in line with expectations, aside from the suspended jail term. I guess though it could have gone a lot worse. We were all confident though, that if there was going to be any chance of being jailed, it would have happened straight away.


Third trip to