madmitch

Phuket Tourism Council President Thanet Tantipiriyakit explained that opening the island to tourism on Dec 1 could see the more than 200,000 tourists arrive under the Sandbox scheme in December, and even more in the first quarter of next year in addition to boosted numbers of domestic tourists coming to Phuket. Surely fully reopened means exactly that, at least to fully vaccinated tourists; no sandbox, no COE, no covid testing once in the country, bars and restaurants open and a free choice of where to stay, whether SHA+ or not. Or is my interpretation a little different?

Exactly. A year and a half of no business and then get hit with this. Still have to pay the room tax though, and despite not having guests, you still have to complete the form every month and email ot to the OrBorJor to declare a zero amount or you get a fine!

“Additionally, I also want responsible officers to adjust the method of counting high-risk arrivals on the plane because they must go into a quarantine venue, instead of traveling,” What does this mean? Surely no one on the plane should be deemed high risk as they have already been tested and have jumped through all the hoops to get the certificate of entry. The hotel licensing issue is a difficult one. If they don't introduce a specific classification for small hotels, many will simply go out of business, if they haven't already. The documents required, including original plans for the buildings, are numerous and unobtainable for many. And the aditional information required for SHA approval is aimed at large hotels with full restaurant facilities. Very unfair to expect Somchai's Guesthouse to have the same approval process as the Hilton

If you use an Android Box you need to get a remote mouse. It makes navigation so much easier. Loads on Lazada. Mine has a keyboard on the back which is quite useful.

Yep, the calculator strikes again. 28,000 arrivals. 10,492 gone home 17.705 gone to other provinces 4,963 still in Phuket Well done team!

I've been back in England for four weeks. My impression is that long haul travel is simply not on most people's agenda for various reasons. I'm sure there's a similar feeling across much of Europe and North America.

Rebuilding the economy = making more money for CP, Central and the other big boys. Will small businesses be supported?

It doesn't state whether Thai tourists can stay anywhere or whether they're limited to SHA+ hotels. Anyone know?

Chaos? Probably the exact opposite????

I thought the picture was an advertisement for hair dye!

Best column for some time, Rooster. Thank you.

It is possible to get infected between the test and arrival in the UK. Home quarantine arrivals are not controlled at the UK airport in any way and are free to use public transport to get to their homes. They are permitted to go outside for posting compulsory PCR tests to the lab and the temptation is there to pop into the local Tesco. Get away with it then and they do it again. I played it by the book until my 5 day test to release but with no checks I'm sure there are many that don't. The Government knows this, hence the hotel quarantine for red list arrivals.

My post didn't age well!

Big Joke is currently heading a police reform operation. He doesn't need to look much further than this case if the operation is in any way serious!

Not quite sure whether you're saying you don't want to go back to the UK or can't go back to the UK. You don't need to be vaccinated to get into Britain.

They'll produce precisely 150,000 doses and ship them off to Bhutan as repayment.

I've been reading this quality tourism BS, along with the same disparaging forum posts, for the past 20 years or so. It'll never happen but it's yet another example of how this government is totally unsupportive of small businesses. I'm in the UK for a while and it seems very few people are remotely interested in long haul travel, yet many are taking holidays in European resorts as they just need a break from after the restrictions of the past year and a half. Life is almost back to normal here. Few people wear masks on the streets, though on public transport and shops they are more visible. Mass events are back; I went to a football match on Saturday and have a couple of concerts to go to and pubs are back to normal.. My 16 year old daughter just walked into a vaccination centre in a shopping mall last week and got a Pfizer jab using her Thai ID card for ID. I'll go for my second AZ later this week having had the first dose in Phuket With this newly found freedom, why would anyone want to holiday in a place where major restrictions are still in place, you might be arrested for having fun in a group and you might have to quarantine at either end of your journey?