briley

Albert can you clarify - I know the state pension is frozen at the rate whey you become non-resident but you infer that the civil service pension (and by extension teacher's pension) is also frozen.

From your experience is this true?

Incidentally it is not terribly difficult to get the DHS to believe you are UK resident .............................

Guesthouse - I agree, nothing has been changed yet and between now and 2012 lots could change. I'm only talking about the promise, and the DHS website points out that changes are proposed but they do not take them into account as they only give a forcast based on the law as it is now. (Or words to that effect!)

I have read the full white paper and whilst it often refers to the changes to help women equality laws means that men must get the same rights. (Is pscheif male or female???) There is a reduction in HRA etc when looking after children as it will only be for children up to age 12 years old, currently it is until they are 18 if in full time enducation. Reducing all to 30 years contribution is partially compensated by the saving on the reduced number getting HRA.

Still a lot of water to go under the bridge before it is law.

But your calculation on pension due to Pscheif is an underestimate. With 24 years paid and ignoring the 5 years from 60-65 (only if resident in UK) pscheif will get 54% of a pension that is about £46 for a single person or £77 for a married person.

Anoyingly you can't get a pension forcast without a UK address - to register you have to have the password thingie sent to a UK address!

Same problem with Radio 5 live during most live football matches and, surprisingly, BBC world service during Saturday sports report.

Used to be able to get around it using a UK proxy but for the last year I haven't been able to get this to work.

PSchef - Assuming that the polititians keep their promise they your are OK - not retiring until after 2012.

24 years paid so you need (under the NEW rules) 6 more years. You can pay up to 6 years back, but if over 2 years late on the payment you pay the current years rate, not the rate for the year you owe, ie a bit more.

You can pay from now until you are 65.

You can also pay for 1996-2001 (aprox) up to 2009 at the rate for the year the liability arises due to a computer error in those years.

So you can easily pay up 30 years.

In addition if you are resident in the UK (or at least the DHS think you are) and you're not working (in the UK) you get free credits from the year you are 60 to the year you are 65, ie 5 years.

So you might be able to make up to 30 years with just 1 payment.

If the rules don't change then having 30 years means you will get 30/44 ths of the full pension.

Towards Pyap University - doesn't look a very good development.

Crossy and I posted at the same time - I suppose you takes your money and makes your choice!

Try an experiment with DVD RW's and a number of players?

As far as I know all DVD's play in all machines.

If you put an NTSC DVD into a PAL machine it either converts on the fly or more likely stretches the picture a bit to make it fit, and vice versa for PAL in an NTSC machine.

I am certain that NW do not 'trade' in currencies or forward buy Baht so we can withdraw £1,000 from an ATM - the amount is too small and the risk too high.

NW - or more probably the Thai bank, use the up to the minute Interbank rate (Thanks, I'd totally forgotten that phrase!)

Whilst agreeing with Chaiyapoon that NW is always by far the best I am a curious peron by nature hence my interest.

OK so you are making me do some research .................

11th November 2005

Inside Bangkok branch 71.671 baht

At ATM outside 71.551 baht

The bad news is that the Fx rate on Friday 11th was 71.335, on next working day (Monday) it was 71.2825 in the morning (lower) and 71.4625 in the afternoon (higher).

Whatever I got BETTER than the Bangkok bank FX rate at Bangkok bank!

Explain that?

PS if nationwide staff know anything about anything I'll eat my hat. They've given me the most rediculous answers to questions in the past.

Same exchange rate? Not a surprise as the rate given is the international rate - goodness knows what it's actual name is.

The rate is set by the markets and used by Visa, Mastercard, banks etc You can see how often Bangkok bank change their rates on their web site, up to 8 times a working day and often by next to nothing.

BUT when I made a withdrawal inside Bangkok Bank (they used their little visa machine) and then imediately at the ATM outside the rates did vary - not much but a few decimal points. My gut feeling is that inside the bank I got todays rate, but the ATM gave me tomorrows rate.

I'm surprised it took 3 minutes for an ATM withdrawal to turn up on yopur account, should be instantaneous since the machine won't give you the money unless the NW computer says OK. :-)

For those who are still paying voluntary NI contributions to get a UK state pension the changes promised on Thursday bring good news.

From 2010 all those with at least 30 years of contributions will get a full state pension. It is being touted as being 'to make things fairer for women' but it does apply to all, men and women. Current rules state men must have 44 years and women 39 years of contributions.

Also talk of a 'significant' increase in the pension before it is linked to earnings from 2012.

Disclaimer - all this is still only politicians promises so if you believe governments .........

Some people get things so wrong.

As Totster said NW do not make the 2.5% and above charge made by all other UK cards (except Liverpool Victoria) and so are at least 2.5% "cheaper" than any other card. In addition the 2.5% often has a minimum of £3 per transaction, even if you only withdraw £10.

So using NW to get 7,000 baht (at 70 baht to £1) and NW debit you with £100 - all other banks debit £102.50 minimum. That's at least 4 bottles of beer.

Then you have the exchange rate. Topfiled: 1.5% of an exchange rate of 70 baht to £1 is just over 1 baht not 50 sateng (spelling?). I believe you get the telegraphic transfer rate offered by the bank that operates the ATM. In Thailand this is around 0.5 baht less than the actual exchange rate. If on the other hand you sell baht you will pay about 0.5 baht more than the actual exchange rate - this gives a spread between the buy and sell rate of about 1.5%. This is a profit to the Thai bank and the reason they are willing to let you use their ATM machine for no further charge. Don't forget many ATM withdrawals in Thailand attract a charge of a few baht.

So using a NW card does 'cost' about 0.75% of the exchange rate to give a profit to the Thai bank. NW do not make any charge at all.

For information you will get the exchange rate set the day after your withdrawal. Looking at the NW web site and you will find the initial amount deducted from your account is always a little too much, and is corrected on day 3 or 4 when it stops being a trasaction in progress and becomes a withdrawal (or words to that effect)

Visitors to the UK do get emergancy medical treatment free under the NHS.

One thought ...........

I sort of missed any reference to the price you pay for land/condo etc when you come to sell.

I assume that if you sell for 4 million but paid 1 million to buy then you only pay income tax on the growth of 3 million? So you calculate the income tax using the calculations above on the growth in value of the property. Otherwise rather unfair to pay income tax on the total sale price since you could be selling at a loss.

I've had airlines object to my not having return tickets or not having visa's - in every case I have been able to board by signing a waiver. ie promising to pay my fare out if I am refused entry.

I rarely see this posibility mentioned so wonder if it is not always offered as an option by the airlines?

One error to clear up - you can only pay NI contribution up to 6 years back, and only the last 2 years are at the rate for that year, over 2 years old and you pay this years (normally higher) rate.

(Exception for the period in the late 1990's when a computer error occured and these payments are due at the then rate until 2008 or 2009)

As an extra if UK resident and unemployed/not paying NI contributions then from age 60-65 (think actually years you are 59-64) you get your NI contributions credited free.

AFAIK if you don't actually tell them you're non-resident and they see no contributions then you automatically get the credits.

If you read the UK government web site it actually says you stop being entitled to free NHS treatment if you are out of the UK for 6 months.

But if you return you are entitled to treatment from the day you arrive if you say you are intending to move back to living in the UK.

So if you don't mind a little lie there is no problems.

Added:

http://www.dh.gov.uk/PolicyAndGuidance/Int...&chk=Kgqt9s

If that link works it contains the information, and the added point that all UK ordinary residents are entitled to free NHS treatment, no mention of having to pay NI contributions - after all not everyone has to pay, only those with jobs.

(Or use "treatment under nhs free" in www.google.co.uk with pages from UK selected - it is the top link)

Of interest the list of programs that add bits to the context menu in windows explorer are in the registry under:

hkey_classes_root\*\shellex\contextMenuHandlers

If you just delete an entry the associated context junk disappears.

Normal warning back up registry etc etc

Download videoredo (www.videoredo.com?). Free for 30 days and it just joins them without re-coding. Easy to use.

Maybe the lack of reply is because there are so many variables?

I use a small english thai dictionary basically for the transliteration and I can carry it about, any simple one would do.

For Thai English I use the Se-Ed big one so the thai is big enough to read and went for one without transliteration so I have to practice reading Thai. Bit big to carry around.

Where are you? DK bookshop on the moat in Chiang Mai has an extensive range, or even Tesco has some books.

3-3

bkkmadness nearly got the prize but not quite good enough.

Nobody wins so I keep the pot?

I hope that a few of the people who complain about visa's to visit Thailand and the Thai immigration read this thread.

For those with Internet explorer just run down the list until it is highlighted then press delete.

Think you can just paste the gobbledegouk into www.thai2english.com and they sort it all out, for free.

Or the Bagel Cafe, behind the Irish Pub.