MartinL

For a religion that advocates, as I understand it, not harming living creatures, this offering of pigs heads, chickens etc. at temples seems to go against all principles. Never understood it and never get a proper answer when I ask practising 'Buddhists' why dead animal sacrifices are made.

Drawing pension since 2019 under the new pension scheme. Thanks for the article, topt. That's information I knew already. The main thrust of my question, both here and in my message to IPC, is - 'Does a FROZEN pension in payment increase with voluntary contributions?' I have 42 years of NICs, many of those 'contracted out' so that my pension, back in '19 and with the max. number of years I could buy at that time, was 87% of the full pension. Obviously a smaller %age now.

Did an online 90-Day on 11th. June, 07.00. Due on 12th. June. Approved before 09.00 the same day.

I looked at my National Insurance Record online the other day. It said that I had until the end of this tax year to make voluntary NICs for 6 of the years I've been in Thailand - 2010/11 > 2015/16. The necessary payment for each year was stated and working out how much extra pension might result is easy enough. I know it's a good deal, having paid voluntary NICs in the past, so would be inclined to make the extra payments. I'm already receiving my State Pension but I shot off a query to the International Pension Centre asking whether, as an existing pensioner, I could make these extra payments (it's seems possible according to MoneySavingExpert). I also asked whether payments would result in increased pension payments since my pension is frozen. I'm sure DWP would be happy to take the money and then say "Frozen pension = no extra". Has any existing pensioner been through this process and found out whether voluntary NICs increase their existing frozen pension?

Thai citizenship application immediately came to mind. A foreign female spouse doesn't have to fulfil the same financial requirements etc. that a foreign male spouse has to. Both equalised to follow the current foreign female spouse requirements would be good. Not that I'm considering a Thai Citizenship application although I would have at one time - too old for that malarkey now.

Made a small transfer via the Bangkok Bank mobile app at 2.30 pm today and all was OK - got the e-mail confirmation of transfer, along with the transaction record in my phone's photo gallery, almost instantly and the "You've logged into mobile app" e-mail notification about 45 minutes later. Maybe something's changed since 2.30.

Your Option 3 resonates with me, especially the " ... not going to abandon my wife over taxes ... " bit. I'm 70, my wife's 68. Relocating to another country just isn't on - we have grandchildren we'd both miss far too much. In addition, I think my wife might lose her government pension if moving abroad, although that's only a guess. If Thailand taxed all my income, all of which is tax-paid in UK, minus the frequently-mentioned 60k/190k/150k฿ allowances and exemptions (I've not forgotten about the supposed additional 100k฿ 'expenses' but I'm just not convinced by that one) and ignored any possible tax credits or whatever, it'd amount to about 2 weeks income at current FX rates. It'd also be about a month of my wife's pension. I'm not going to throw away my family life here, which I love (Thailand itself, not so much), over a few baht. Of course I'd prefer not to pay Thai income tax but if the choice is 'tax' or 'wife', wife wins hands down of course. "Wait and see" would be a good poll choice but, in practical terms, I'm just going to swallow all this TRD ehist (rearrange) and get on with life. It helps A LOT that my financial situation is a fairly simple one.

The epithet 'far-right' is usually used by the press to describe snarling, shaven-headed, thuggish skinhead types, something most of these people in the photos definitely don't appear to be (despite some naturally bald heads). But I'm sure you knew that.

According to the Flag Institute, either Union FLAG or Union JACK is correct. https://www.flaginstitute.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Union-Jack-or-Union-Flag.pdf The FI seems to come to a pragmatic solution to this controversy.

"Balaclava-clad demonstrators, waving the flag of St George and igniting smoke canisters, filled the streets ... ". I can see plenty of Union and English flags, even a couple of smoke canisters in the hands of some calm, happy-looking people but not many "balaclava-clad demonstrators" in the OP's photos. What a pleasant change from the faceless ones of the pro-Gaza/Hamas crowds. Far-Right???? They look like a bunch of perfectly ordinary folks to me.

Spike Milligan immediately came to mind when I read that. The inscription on his headstone:- Dúirt mé leat go raibh mé breoite = I told you I was sick.

I was half expecting a comment like this 🙂 . Surprised it took so long! Thanks.

Agree ... mostly. But although I have the app., I do everything on my laptop. Same result though .... successful refund every time.

Don't want to belittle your experience, NSJ, but did you start the Lazada returns process proper rather than just contacting the seller? Contacting the seller isn't necessary and seems to just add a extra layer of problems. Personally, I can't remember the last time I contacted a seller prior to a return. I don't know how long ago your chair incident was but, until very recently, once the return process was started, the seller had 3 days to respond after which Lazada automatically assumed return was approved and issued a return label and arranged a courier to pick up. Once the item was received (by Lazada, seller, idk) then refund was approved and made. That seems to have changed within the 2 months since my last returned item. The return I mentioned in the OP - Package was received about 9 am on Monday 19th. May and was obviously wrong, based on size of package alone. I didn't bother to contact the seller. Started the Lazada returns process about 11 am same day, the item was picked up and refund made by 11.20 next day to my Lazada Wallet which was then used to pay for a replacement order, from a different seller, about an hour later. No wait for seller approval and thus a saving of at least 3 days. I was expecting to have to wait those 3 days and was very happy that it wasn't necessary.

I'm going to waste some time here to reply to you even though you're really not worth it.

Spent already on a new order. Simple .... except for you, apparently.

I wanted to post in this thread but it's closed - This is my latest experience with a Lazada refund. I ordered an electric massager for my wife and it arrived in 2 days. It was a COD purchase as are 99+% of our Lazada orders. Unfortunately, it wasn't as described so I started the returns process yesterday afternoon and we were at the "Pending pick-up" stage. About 11.15 am today, we got a call from the return courier to say they'd collect in 30 minutes. But we had no return label for the parcel. The courier arrived and, while she was waiting and chatting to Mrs.L, the label arrived for printing. At the same time, the refund was made to my Lazada Wallet, even though the courier hadn't actually touched the package at that point. Label was attached and the courier was on her way. Last time we returned something, we had to wait 3 days (?) for seller approval and then maybe another day for the return label to be generated. No waiting this time. All in all, a very good return/refund experience and, TBH, all my recent returns have been dealt with well although not as swiftly as this one, probably because of the seller approval requirement mentioned.

I can't answer your question re. the licence but just a word of warning on payments. Last year, I paid for my UK car hire about 2 months before I needed the car, at the time of booking online, and paid in full (apart from some small extras that had to be paid at pick-up) with my UK debit card. No problems there. When picking-up the car and after having presented Thai licence, flight boarding pass etc., I tried to pay the small extras with the same UK card I'd used for booking. The computer just spat it out - couldn't accept that UK card. It seems to have been that my UK card was registered to a UK address (true and not normally a problem) but the computer, via the licence, had now registered me as 'Thai' and couldn't reconcile that with a UK address. I had to use my Bangkok Bank card, with Thai address, to pay and that sailed through with no hitches whatsoever.

On 18th. April I contacted International Pension Centre online ( https://secure.dwp.gov.uk/contact-the-international-pension-centre/contact-form ) to ask whether or not I'd been sent a LC for 2024. This is something I do most years, around April time since the crippled-snail mail they insist on using can take 2 months or more to arrive, and I've never failed to get a reply. On this occasion, the reply came a few days later to say that no LC had been sent this year. After an interval of 2 weeks or so after returning a LC, I also send a message to the same address asking if it's been received. Post office tracking has, in the past, shown the letter to be stuck at a sorting office when, in reality, it has been successfully delivered. Once again, I've always received a reply.

I like the thought of the Thai Red Cross creating a body. I'm sure you meant 'cremate' though 🙂

Please move to a more appropriate forum if not suitable for "HEALTH and Medicine". My 90 y.o. friend made formal arrangements, years ago, to donate his body to a hospital medical school in Khon Kaen on his death. Now he feels he's approaching the end of his life, he checked to make sure arrangements were still in place. He was told that the hospital can no longer take the bodies of foreigners because of "problems with embassy", something they couldn't or wouldn't elaborate on. I can't see why his embassy - UK - would have any objections to or interest in him making such a donation after death. He has no children, no UK family, nobody to make claims on him. His Thai wife is his next of kin. I don't think he's made a Will in which he could specify donation of his body since he has nobody to inherit his estate except his wife so that's taken care of by Thai inheritance law. His wife agrees to his donation. A forum search resulted in a Chiang Mai forum recent thread on the same subject that suggested donation by a foreigner IS possible and a hospital in the north-east is specifically mentioned in one post. Is there, in reality, a restriction on taking foreigners' bodies? Is it up to individual hospitals to accept or reject foreigners? Is the hospital basing its rejection on out-of-date instructions from the government? Of course, they might be rejecting him because of age without actually saying as much. I've been thinking of doing this myself but if the restriction stands, there doesn't seem much point.

So now even "resembling foreigners' is a potential offence, is it? There seems to be no end of ways they're trying to finger foreigners for Thai crime. Surely, if the thieves definitely were foreigners, it would have been one of the first things used to describe them by the shop staff.

Since when has Phrae province been in Isaan, or has there been a wholesale redefinition of Thailand's regions while I was asleep? A few weeks ago it was 'crocodiles in Nakhon Sawan' now this.

Attempted rape of a doctor by a Thai and kicking of a doctor by a foreigner ...... it'd be interesting to know the comparison of the final sentences in both these cases. But we'll never know because, while the foreigner's case will be publicised widely and enthusiastically, the Thai's will be lost in the mass of other news.