11 hours ago, connda said:

Unbelievable!

No, it's called the law

Thai's don't give you Thai social security just because you are married to a Thai !  So the US doesn't give you full benefits if your wife is not a citizen  and has not contributed to the social security fund.  If your wife is a citizen, she will have contributed to US social security either directly or indirectly due to marriage 

Sorry,  but the IRS has to be able to differentiate so they use Social Security rules as one of their benchmarks 

48 minutes ago, stevenl said:

Nothing to see there.

 

Now I can see it, but it has no reflection at all on my post. Unless you think Trump does not have the authority to release a guideline?

Yesterday, he said had the authority to ORDER the end of the lock down, today it's authority to RELEASE  guidelines

What will it be tomorrow ?  

Trumps insane actions are like you complaining that it took the fire department too long to come and save your burning house

Next time maybe they should stay in the station and let it burn to the ground and blame lack of water pressure for your loss  

37 minutes ago, stevenl said:

But it seems a reasonable and well thought out guideline.

You think leaving it up to the state governors is a guideline, here is the guideline, already written in stone, nothing new here:

Why does everyone try and make this complicated !  

Yes, as an expat (being out of the US at tax time) you can get an automatic extension, BUT, that extension does not exempt you from paying your taxes due on April 15th, and your extension does not exempts you from penalties and interest.

(source: https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/understanding-penalties-and-interest)

And of course if you are owed money then you would be foolish to take that extension

The difference this year ONLY, is that the official filing date is no longer April 15th but July 15th and more importantly even if you owe the IRS you do not have to pay them until July 15th.  This also means that if you end up having to pay estimated taxes for tax year 2020 your estimated payments also start on July 15th, not April 15th  

Depend upon whether or not your company took unemployment, FICA, and Social Security out of your pay check, kind of doubt is though,  since not having to pay those taxes is one of the incentives to get employees to take overseas assignments

But if you are working as a civilian as a Department of Defense contractor or other US government agency then you are probably covered but would have to apply in your home state, since unemployment is handled at the state level 

Just hope your state doesn't have an in person registration requirement  

17 minutes ago, khaepmu said:

Why don't I deserve one?

It's in the name, a stimulus for the US economy, not the Thai economy, and what you spend in the US on vacations, online ordering, and buying US equities,  doesn't help the US economy NOW

You chose to live in Thailand so don't complain about what your are missing by not living in the US, and I am sure that what you save by living here is much more than a one time stimulus check 

If anyone ever needed evidence of how the Government of Thailand feels about us this Immigration fiasco rates right up there and is their final word

They either want our money or to see us dead and it seems that they are only making options that insure that it will be the death option that will be the one we take

Thais have to put up with this incompetency in all aspects of their lives, I don't and paradise is no longer paradise but has turned into a horror show 

21 hours ago, i84teen said:

why do u need a vpn for banking? Are you doing your banking on public wifi such as starbucks?

See what Pib said

You reap what you sow

Quote

Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly resigned a day after leaked audio revealed he called the ousted commander of the USS Theodore Roosevelt "stupid" in an address to the ship's crew.

source: 

3 minutes ago, baansgr said:

It's actually 8 stories...and Delmare only got permission for 33 floors as they built the road and one of the directors of Porchland was on the Chonburi planning committee....but Jomtien has facilities and infrastructure

Corruption is corruption by any name and what happened once is sure to happen again , they built the road not out of altruism but because they had to get to their building site and could not encroach on adjacent lots.

And this happened years after the controversy from building a condo in Jomtien that blocked everyone's view of the water, which hastened the 12 or 8 story regulation in the first place

11 hours ago, Crazy Alex said:

I'm a veteran and I couldn't care less.

31 minutes ago, Langsuan Man said:

Thank you for your service 

 

 

25 minutes ago, bristolboy said:

So maybe "Provisional thanks for your alleged service?"

It's called sarcasm people 

Yeah,  the developers used the loop hole in the law that limited condos to be no higher than 12 stories X number of meters from the beach by putting their parking lot in front of the monster condo, to satisfy the distance requirement.  There is no consideration in this country on the spirit of the law, but just how you can get around it as written

And there are still many vacant beach view lots that are just waiting for the same treatment.  Bang Sarey will soon mirror the sprawl that is Jomtien,  that you can see from the Bang Saray beach on a clear night 

10 hours ago, Crazy Alex said:

I'm a veteran and I couldn't care less.

Thank you for your service 

Home Pro near me, Ban Amphur / Ban Sarey,pulled an interesting one on me the other day.  Like PiB says I always tell them, with a smile, Thai Baht please and they have always complied, this time though the cashier pointed to a sign with many credit and bank cards on it and pointed to the Bangkok Bank card.  I shook my head and gave her my US based Credit card.  The transaction was rung up in Baht but I received a strange receipt with the Dynamic Conversion that PiB mentions, on the top of the normal receipt, yet when processed by my US bank received a better/different exchange rate.  See for yourself:

I wonder it this dual pricing policy was taken into account when the insurance companies in Thailand priced the mandatory health insurance required for O-A long stay visas ?

Seems to me we should be getting the benefits of lower co-pays since the Thai government is telling us that we have to pay more because we are foreign and must have the useless insurance !

On 4/5/2020 at 8:10 AM, rooster59 said:

He's a total disgrace': Trump defends firing U.S. intel watchdog

Pot here is kettle to bash 

Here are my speeds just done now using Express and I see no degradation of signal:

18 hours ago, JimmyJ said:

Someone mentioned in another thread that they were planning to do this (perhaps you), and others mentioned it being illegal.

You can't be prosecuted for a crime if you are dead. so don't worry about the legality OP, do what has to be done to get the job done

I really wish the law and order types here would get a grip