champken

any recommendations for travelling from Bangkok to there?

How long does it take to do the visa? 2 nights?

Cheap?

Medium?

Expansive? Flights are rare...

Overland the bus journey is around 9 hours. You could go by train to Ubon and then a bus from there or fly to Ubon and bus from there if you don't want to spend all night on a bus.

I have just done that. I managed to get a return from Don Mueang to Ubon for about 1200 all in which I was very pleased with. I just couldn't face that long bus journey although you do still have about 3 hours from Ubon to Mukdahan. If you time it right (I did not) then you need only spend I night in Savannakhet but as has already been stated, your visa application must be in by 11am.

Having just come back from my first ever trip to obtain a non o from Savannakhet, there were a couple of things that stood out for me about the journey. Firstly, once you are on the bus that takes you between Savannakhet and Mukdahan, you must lose all your politeness and manners...be brutal, push in, barge people out of your way and give way to no 5 foot tall Asians..in order to not have to wait for another hour for the next bus because the driver will leave you behind if you are not through immigration quickly enough...so try to sit as near to the front of the bus as possible and try to have a downloaded visa on arrival form for Laos already filled in with your $35 to hand over.

If you are a good walker then the Bus station is no more than a 15 minute walk to the Thai consulate, so there is absolutely no need to use a tuk tuk driver either coming into Savannakhet or going out, in fact going out you will still need to purchase a bus ticket and wait for the bus to come anyway, so why not just walk down to the bus station and get straight on the bus.

The new profile of the pattaya sex tourist is disturbing.

Well at least the cops look to be targeting that profile without fear that the PC brigade might be offended.

You should have at least a year remaining on your passport to apply for the visa. The rules state 18 months is required.but that is not often enforced.

If your passport expires before the visa expires you can use both passports to use the visa in the old one after getting a new one.

If as in my case your passport has only a few empty pages left and so not enough to utilise a 1 year non o visa, can I then use a new passport along with the one I got the visa in to do say three monthly border runs or three monthly trips in? Or when the passport which has the visa in is full, do I need to go to immigration to have the visa transferred to my new passport?

Agree with niccodemi...consider a Kurngsri Mee Tae Dai account. You can withdraw funds anytime without any interest penalty like a fixed account, but if you withdraw more than twice a month there is a Bt50 (fifty) fee per 3d and up withdrawal that month. A half dozen or so debit cards you can get with the account...including those that are kinda pricey which include insurance. I got the one with an no annual fee but you must take SMS service at Bt19/month which adds up tgo Bt228/year but I like the SMS service since it sends you immediately an SMS of any deposits or withdrawals you make. Full ibanking access also...transfer money in and out at will. No 15% withholding tax like in a fixed account unless you exceed Bt20K gross interest per year.

I too have had Bangkok Bank fixed accounts for several years but late last year when my latest fixed account matured Bangkok Bank didn't have anything that interested me since interest rates have dropped so much at all Thai banks. About the best they had a the time was a 10 month fixed account paying around 1.7%. Heck, since I had already had Krungsri Mee Tai Dai account paying more than that I didn't open another Bangkok Bank fixed account and moved the money to my Krungsri Mee Tai Dai account paying approx 1.8% at the time for the amount I had in it. But as of 11 Dec 15 it's paying 1.7% amount between 100K and 10M baht (see below cut and paste I grab from the Krungsri interest rate sheet a few minutes ago).

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Unless you are trying to squeak every possible stang out of your savings account even when withdrawal/interest penalties may be included in getting those extra stang, a Krungsri Mee Tai Dai account pays basically the same rate (or more) as many fixed accounts without the restrictions of a fixed account. I'm also a U.S. person...not an issue with Krungsri...just fill out their FATCA related questionnaire and IRS W-9 form...easy...took an extra 5 minutes.

Thanks very much for your informative post. Sounds just what I'm looking for too especially if you can get a card with no annual fee with it.

Normally you will find somewhere in the Terms and Conditions a way that covers the <deleted> of any company, bank, or whoever you have purchased goods or a service off

If i was ever in any need of a Lawyer here then i would be looking in the direction of Bangkok. The legal profession in Pattaya from top to bottom is full of bent unqualified people who will sell you out to the other side if the price is right.

If he was reported to immigration by another farang and it turns out that he has hung himself, as was stated by another poster, then I hope that dirty snake farang that reported him rots in hell

Yes seize their assets...they all plead poverty..but most have the latest mobiles..are they payg..if so how & when do they top up..?...contract..how they paying for it..?...and as for paying people smugglers up to £7/8000 per person...thats £20-000+ for a family of 4..and they plead poverty ...dont make me laugh.

What makes me laugh they think they have a divine right to march through europe and go to whatever country that takes their fancy..."its nice here..lets stay"...can you imagine what would happen If they came to Thailand...<deleted>

Where ever they go they cause trouble...UK/Germany/France..etc...they think they are above the law.

Where ever they settle they DONT integrate with locals...EVER...large areas of the UK [my home] there are now NO GO areas for police etc,

I am not a racist by any means...live & let live i say ....let them have a better life...YES...IN THERE OWN COUNTRY .

So yes seize their assets...NOT mine or my fellow countrymen...welfare benefits....NHS...housing etc...that I + many others have paid in for years to help the needy.....not the economic parasites.

I could go on & on...thanks for reading...but think about it

Damn right.

120 Baht for a pie to me is expensive unless there is enough in one to feed two people. I think the guys rent must be on the high side to justify that price and judging by some feedback i have heard (apart from the OP who may or may not ..............) the pies are not that good but they are ok

Not so very long ago i used to pay 1700 direct to the drivers, they now want 2200 which is inclusive and includes a Thai meal on the way back.

When it was 1700 I would rather go on a run than deal with the hassle at immigration and pay 1900

I suspect that their bosses decided that due to the decreased numbers using their service and consequently less income that they would quickly raise the cost. If anybody pays less than 2200 then I'm all ears?

Its already been asked I know but I will try again. How much are these pies?

I must admit that i have often used VT1 for parking when catching the airport bus, and if i am traveling light then ive left my motorbike there. Never a problem to date.

I am currently in dispute with Nationwide UK over this very charge.

If you go onto there website and click on fees and charges for SWIFT transfer it will say £20, and if you verbally ask one of their staff what the charge is, you will be told £20. However, tucked away in the terms and conditions you will find reference to them using a third party (HSBC) to facilitate the transfer and they may(will) levy a charge against you for doing so.

All a bit underhanded in my book, and on top of that, because I wasn't expecting this extra scam of a charge, it put me overdrawn and incurring interest charges, albeit miniscule amounts. So at the moment as a matter of principle I am trying to get the charges taken off

I used Nationwide to transfer my pension monthly then got stumped with the additional charge from HSBC Like you I kicked and screamed but to no avail, they claim to have no control over the intermediate bank.

Since then i've found Transferwise Use the link for a free transfer of upto 3000 GBP. therafter there is a fee to pay but its cheaper than Nationwide.

Another one I've found and again have used with no issues is Xendpay their charges are even less you get 10 GBP credit on your first transfer and the fee is around 6 GBP per 1000 GBP but they do say you can pay what you think is fair.

Both take 3-5 Business days so dont get alarmed, I haven't been let down to date, They both seem to give a better rate than the TT Rate too.

The point for me with Nationwide is that they are not up front with customers about these extra charges and it almost seems like they are deliberately hiding and so deceiving people which if true is shocking.

I am just waiting for the overdraft interest charges to hit my account and then if I get nowhere with Nationwide then I'm going to try the financial ombudsman or at least threaten them with it

I am currently in dispute with Nationwide UK over this very charge.

If you go onto there website and click on fees and charges for SWIFT transfer it will say £20, and if you verbally ask one of their staff what the charge is, you will be told £20. However, tucked away in the terms and conditions you will find reference to them using a third party (HSBC) to facilitate the transfer and they may(will) levy a charge against you for doing so.

All a bit underhanded in my book, and on top of that, because I wasn't expecting this extra scam of a charge, it put me overdrawn and incurring interest charges, albeit miniscule amounts. So at the moment as a matter of principle I am trying to get the charges taken off

I think it was mentioned on another topic but as a heads up to others that dont know is that if you use SWIFT transfer with Nationwide, UK , you will be charged by three banks, Nationwide, the beneficiary bank and a third party which is likely to be HSBC.

While Nationwide don't exactly hide this information, its certainly not displayed on their website as an additional charge that needs to be added or mentioned at all when verbally speaking to one of their staff

There seem an awful lot of these good guy taxi drivers around in Thailand.

Along with noise, the inherent greed and dishonesty of many of the people, and the laissez-faire attitude of many of the rest, are the things that I dislike most about Thailand.

I seem to encounter this greed and dishonesty far too often these days to the point where it almost feels like its a piss take even if mostly its for petty cash amounts

There is no doubt in my mind that Tinsley did NOT attempt to murder Adam Pickles and i am also sure that he would not have wanted to have been responsible for how Adam is today, however, i do see Tinsley as a wannabe hard man that wanted to give somebody a good hiding and then show off about it and score points with his drinking buddies.

Actually the more I watch this clip, the more of a buzz I get. I just wish that we could see that plenty of damage was done to the little punks motorbike. Teach him to rip off somebody's wing mirror eh?

There have been many times when I would have loved to have done something similar.....

I would imagine that death might be an easy way out for him.

Moneycorp and Transferwire give good rates but you will still need to provide them money laundering docs to set up an account. At 20 quid a Swift transfer isn't that bad through Nationwide etc.....you may wanna be quick as Sterling has already gone down 2 baht in the past 7 weeks.....quite a bit on 60K

Funnily enough i have just used a swift transfer through Nationwide for 59k to purchase another condo. The money arrived in my newly set up Krunsri bank account this morning where they gave me a rate of 54.10. and you are right, Nationwide charged me 20 quid.

HSBC only charge 4 quid for a swift transfer but the maximum they will do in one go is 50k

I have just paid 50,000 deposit on a 3 million baht unit that I didn't want to chance losing. It is in a complex where I already have a condo and I know of the seller, but as has been suggested I wouldn't normally pay a deposit in this market where there is a glut of condos for sale and you can complete the whole sale at the land office within a week

I would say that officialy YES but in reality maybe not.

who is lying? The evidence is clear, he used some form of a metal iron bar in his brutal attack, the question is, how did he get off with last time? l wonder.

I think you might find that during the time Tinsley was running his shady visa shop and having from time to time use the under the table payment method to keep certain people sweet, he managed to perhaps gain some useful contacts.

Anybody remember the dodgy visas that came from Birmingham that you need not leave the country for?