All four of our destinations now have a way for someone to stay and work remotely, and not one of them is a product a travel agency sells. The permit is between the traveller and an immigration authority. The stay around it — three months of accommodation, a connection that works at eight in the morning, a local number, a neighbourhood chosen for weekdays rather than weekends — is ground handling, and at this length it is a market that did not exist a few years ago.
The trap is not the segment. It is the numbers. Income thresholds, permit lengths and renewal rules for these routes circulate online with great confidence and very poor sourcing, and an agent who repeats one is making a promise about a foreign ministry's decision.
Qué está realmente cerrado, por destino
Corea is the clearest of the four because the change was reported by the national press rather than by consultancies. The Korea Immigration Service has run the digital nomad, or workation, route permanently since 30 June 2026, after a pilot that began at the start of 2024. The maximum stay rose from two years to three. The income floor now slides between one and two times per capita gross national income according to the applicant's age and the region they settle in, with 18-to-34-year-olds moving outside greater Seoul at the lower end; the figures were reported against a per capita GNI of 52.41 million won, which puts the upper end around 100 million. The holder works remotely for a company registered outside Korea and cannot take a Korean employer.
Indonesia has two genuinely different routes, and the distinction is the only part an agent can safely rely on. One is a remote-worker permit for income earned outside Indonesia, working for a foreign employer or foreign clients, which does not allow working for an Indonesian employer. The other is a second home route resting on a deposit or property investment rather than on monthly income, described everywhere as considerably longer. Search for either and you get immigration-consultancy pages almost exclusively, contradicting each other on the threshold, on the duration and even on whether the remote-worker permit renews. No wire service and no official page appears in the results.
Japón and Tailandia each have a route of their own, with their own eligibility tests, durations and documentary requirements. We are deliberately not printing those here, for the same reason: take them from the immigration authority for the client's nationality and the client's dates, and write down when you checked.
Por qué este artículo no publica más cifras
Because of who carries the consequence. Tell a client they need a particular income and they do not get the permit, and the conversation comes back to you rather than to the page you read it on. Point at the official channel, say what you read and when you read it, and stop there.
Two rules make that easy to hold. Never convert a threshold into the client's currency — those figures are set against a local basis that gets revised, and a converted number carries an exchange rate nobody recorded and ages invisibly. And record the date you checked, because Korea's route has moved twice in two and a half years and Indonesia's is reported inconsistently today.
Nobody in the travel chain advises on eligibility. A licensed immigration professional is the right referral, and making it does not lose you the booking: the stay is still yours.
Lo que una estancia larga necesita y unas vacaciones no
- Accommodation that works on a Tuesday. A desk at the right height, a chair with a back, a lamp and floor space to stand up in. Serviced apartments and residence hotels do this; a standard twin does not.
- Connectivity contracted rather than assumed. A video call at eight in the morning is a business requirement. Confirm the actual connection in the actual room, not the property's marketing line.
- A local number and a working payment method. Deliveries, reservations, hospital reception desks and building entry systems assume one, in all four countries.
- A neighbourhood chosen for weekdays. Nightlife districts are the wrong answer for someone with calls at seven in the morning — in Seoul, Bangkok, Canggu or Tokyo alike.
- Transport that suits independence. Long-stay clients want a transit card and a walk, not a daily private transfer, and the cost structure of a month is not the cost structure of a week.
- Somebody to call. Over three months a landlord, a hospital or a lost card will happen. A 24/7 desk in the local language is the difference between an inconvenience and a crisis.
El mercado más cercano: workations corporativas
A company sending a team for two weeks of remote work plus an offsite usually needs none of these visas. It needs meeting space, reliable connectivity, a room block that tolerates a working day and a programme for the evenings — which is ordinary MICE work in a different shape, and it converts far faster than the individual long-stay enquiry does. If you have corporate clients asking about "somewhere warm for a fortnight where the team can still work", that is the product, and all four destinations do it well.
Cómo tratar la consulta
Separate the stay from the permit in writing — your contract covers accommodation, ground and support, and not an immigration outcome. Write the cancellation terms for a refusal before anyone pays anything, because that is the most likely way a long-stay file collapses. Take accommodation terms in months rather than nights: long-stay rates, deposits, utilities, cleaning frequency and extension are separate questions. And ask what the client actually wants, because a three-month working stay, a retirement plan and a property purchase are three different conversations and only one of them is yours.
Our Asia group connectivity guide covers the data and roaming layer across the four, which is the part long-stay clients ask about first and check least.
Preguntas frecuentes
Does Explera file these visas? No. We are a destination management company. We do not file applications, assess eligibility or advise on immigration in any form, and we will say so to your client in writing if it helps.
Which destination is easiest? That depends on nationality, income and where the client wants to live, and it is a question for an immigration professional rather than for us. What we can answer is what the stay costs and what the week looks like in each.
Can we quote the Korean income figures? Quote them with their basis and their date, as reported — one to two times per capita GNI against a 52.41 million won basis — rather than as a converted round number. The basis is what gets revised.
Why are the Indonesian figures treated differently? Because the available sources are consultancy pages that contradict each other inside single articles. The structure is consistent; the numbers are not, and that is worth telling a client honestly.
What is the shortest stay worth handling this way? Anything from about a month. Below that it is a hotel booking with a good desk; above it, it is closer to a relocation file with a travel company's service level attached.
Send the length, the city and the profile — one person, a family or a team — to b2b@expleradmc.com or message the trade desk on WhatsApp +66 93 656 8090. Explera DMC is IATA TIDS-registered (96215733) and gives no immigration advice.
