At a briefing at Phuket Provincial Hall on August 7, 2026, Deputy Interior Minister Worasit Liangprasit said 117 hotel-business-licence applications remained under review. ThaiRath, The Standard and Rawai.com each reported that figure and a target to bring the outstanding applications up to date by September 2026.
No public official release or licence register for the August 7 briefing was located in the reviewed provincial and national government portals. The figures below are therefore attributed to those reports rather than presented as an auditable government ledger.
What happened
The reports describe a long-running licensing backlog, but not with one reconciled starting figure. ThaiRath and The Standard say it involved about 400 to 500 applications, while Rawai.com describes the same range as unresolved for six to seven years and The Standard describes cases pending for more than seven years. The reports do not explain the difference in the stated age or whether every figure refers to exactly the same group of applications.
They do agree on the reported recent pace: nearly 300 applications were processed in the preceding two months, and 117 remained on August 7. That is a report of administrative progress, not a public list of approvals. TopNews separately reported that Liangprasit presented hotel-business licences for 29 hotel establishments at the event; ThaiRath and Rawai.com also reported a licence presentation, without giving that count.
Who is affected
The immediate group is the applicants still awaiting a decision and the hotel establishments covered by licences presented at the briefing. The reports do not publish the establishments or licence reference numbers for the 29 licences, nor the reference numbers of the remaining applications.
For a hotel, resort or villa-rental buyer, a pending application should not be treated as evidence of an issued licence. Ask the seller for the issued licence or a documented exemption. A pending application is only an administrative status; it does not authorize hotel operation or short-term-rental income. Use the application reference and current status only to verify the case. Our guide to short-term rentals and the Hotel Act explains the wider licensing framework.
What it may mean for Phuket property
Houseviser analysis. The briefing suggests that applications already in the administrative process are moving faster than before. It does not quantify the separate population of accommodation businesses that have never filed an application, and it does not establish the position of any individual property. A buyer should assess a specific operation on its documents, not on the reported backlog totals.
What remains unknown
- Whether all 117 reported pending applications will be completed by September 2026, and how many will receive licences.
- Why reports describe the earlier backlog as both six to seven years old and more than seven years old.
- The hotel establishments and licence reference numbers covered by the 29 licences reported by TopNews.
- Whether the reported 400-to-500-case backlog overlaps with businesses that had not filed an application at all.
This article is not legal advice.