What happens if your flight is cancelled on the last day of your visa; does it vary by country/region?

Question

The question My cancelled flight caused me to overstay my visa and now my visa application was rejected and its answer are most informative! (it asks specifically what happens when you overstay in Schengen (Europe) visa area).

Important part of the answer:

A visa extension can be considered ... in the case of force majeure. Example: No air traffic due to weather conditions or strike

This question is similar but I hope to learn if this strict, but common sense approach is generally true, that is, can we sensibly assume it applies to most/all other areas of the world too?

Unimportant note

In case it's of interest, I have a flight 3 hours before midnight on the last day of my visa in Thailand, so if there's any significant delay, I'll have overstayed my visa. But rather than looking up this specific country's policies, I wonder if I can apply the general principle of expecting them to be "strict, but have common sense" as per the answer in the case of the Schengen area, that is, can we assume this principle to apply to every other country too, or is it more the case that countries differ significantly in their principles and therefore you cannot generalise, but have to look them up individually.

Answer 1

I don't think there is a "one size fits all" answer here. This will depend on the airline, the country, the type of Visa and partially on the mood of the officers that ran into it.

I have a flight 3 hours before midnight on the last day of my visa in Thailand, so if there's any significant delay, I'll have overstayed my visa.

Maybe. Its worth checking what exactly constitutes your time of "leaving the country". I would think the most practical definition would be when you show up at exit immigration and an officer looks at your papers as that's the point they have to look at your stuff anyway. Any other time options (scheduled departure, actual gate closing time, lift off time, leaving Thai airspace, etc) would be more complicated and there is no benefit for them doing so.

So chances are as long as you show you in in exit immigration before your Visa expires, you will be fine. Of course, that doesn't help if they don't allow you to check in before midnight in the first place: you need a boarding pass to get to exit immigration. If the airline will NOT give a boarding pass before your Visa expiration you should contact them and lean in hard for information and support. They typically know what happens at this specific airport and country.

Here is one example how this can play out. We were departing Beijing. The incoming plane was diverted because of heavy smog, the crew timed out before they were able to get the plane to Beijing and the flight was moved to the next day. At this point most passengers had checked in and were in the departure area. Many passengers only had a single-entry Visa which already head been invalidated in exit immigration, so they weren't allowed to re-enter the country for the night.

Turns out they had a process for this: Everybody got stamped a emergency/transit/short time Visa into their passport. They then herded into a bus and drove us to a hotel. We were allowed to roam around in the hotel but not leave the general premises, so we were "sort of" in China proper. Next day the process happened in reverse and we finally departed (albeit 28 hours late).

Answer 2

In most cases visa overstays will be evaluated case by case but countries (or groups of countries like Schengen) will have guidelines for the officers who have to deal with the cases.

And there might well be different guidelines between different kinds of visa, even within one country for people of one other country.

It is known that some countries have very strict rules while others are less strict.

Usually an overstay beyond your control is deemed less bad and while you often have to apply for an extension of the visa before it expires even that is not a given.