keestha

I always use Agoda ,Trip advisor etc to find the hotels and feedback about them, then contact the hotels direct. Cut out ANY middlemen as its always cheaper and safer and never had any problems with "not received booking" etc.

Exactly. If you contact the hotel directly, you might also be offered a wider range of choice as far as different types of rooms is concerned.

Sticking to the original topic of the thread: since about 5 days Khao Lak is completely overrun with tourists, difficult to find a room in the lower price bracket category. I have to send people away constantly because my 15 room hotel doesn't have any vacancy.

One reason might be people cancelling their diving/snorkeling holiday in Egypt.

Guess lots of people are doing now what I just finished doing: scrolling down in the hope of seeing some pictures clarifying this matter.

Picture painted above also applies for up and coming Khao Lak. Number of tourists not so bad, but for the continiously expanding number of restaurants, bars, diving schools, tourcounters, tailor shops and massage parlours pickings are getting meager.

International Hospital also offers a health insurance package, there should be people here who have looked into this or have experience with it?

In order to get a work permit, you need a non-immigrant visa. Even though some provincial authorities may say you need a non-B, this is not true. You can get a WP if you have a non-O. If they don't agree, make them call to Bangkok!

I wouldn't really expect they immediately comply to the request to call to Bkk, and then write out a work permit after having profusely apologized for their ignorance.

More likely they would refuse flatly and nod to the next person waiting to come forward.

About a week ago I booked the Regent hotel Suvarnabhumi for a customer. For a single room the charge is 1500 Baht, and for an additional 700 Baht you can stay till 10 PM the next day. Convenient if catching a flight to Europe, typically leaving around 1 AM.

Metal detectors have always intrigued me, though I have never owned or even used one. I guess if at Patong beach if you would walk through the surf when the tide is at its lowest, and use an underwater one, you would find quite a few rings, necklaces and so on, lost by swimming tourists.

Gee Torono, I hope your business plan will not get messed up now because too many people are getting the idea.

I am getting a bit dizzy reading all of this....A customer of mine also said he saw flight prices to Thailand going up when trying to book briefly before departure.

Maybe it could be considered to pin this thread, people are bound to remain interested in this subject.

can easily get a work permit for being the "Owner" of the business just like my work permit said in Thai of course.

"Owner" is not a job description. My work permit states I am the general manager of the company I established. Another job description is also possible of course - like cook for instance.

Check out the many small quiet beach resorts in Prachuabkhirikhan province (south of Hua Hin), going from north to south: Pranburi, Sam Roi Yot, Thap Sakae, Ban Krut, Bang Saphan Yai, Bang Saphan Noi.

But no-one there and after all , beaches are supposedly the property of the King so why should these people think they can charge 100bht for access?

It is their right to not allow people to pass through their property, or to charge for it.

If however you would access the beach by boat, they couldn't legally stop or charge you.

I bought my coffee machine at Boncafe/Phuket, and purchased their beans for 8 years. About 2 years ago I changed to buying coffee beans in a small specialized coffee store in Takua Pa, same quality but a lot cheaper. But maybe Boncafe's offer to purchase beans at a discounted price if you bought a coffee machine there is something new.

I have been told in Laos you can buy high quality coffee beans quite cheaply.

Quoting chiangmai: "I buy most of my petrol from that station and I've never had a problem with being short changed/short delivery, but there again, I always stand next to the pump from start to finish, I think it's inviting problems not to. On a slightly lighter note: there's a katoey who works at that station who has a serious attitude problem with farangs and Thai/English language usage. Ask for "Gow nung, nung pan baht" and this will be met with, "ninety what and how much do you want", in exasperated tones - repeat the order in English and he/she/it will glare and point out in a huff that it's "gow nung, nung pan baht", the humorous part of this being that he/she/it will repeat this process every time you visit, in my case for the past twenty visits or so, it's really quite entertaining and sad."

Maybe Esso has a policy of hiring people like that. At the Esso station on the left close to the turnoff to the airport (when you are coming from the bridge), lately when I delivered my familiar line "puhm nam man nung pan baht" for the 1200th time, the lady working reacted like I was speaking John the Baptist's native language.

Only real problem I have ever had with a gasstation, was them filling up my tank with a mixture of diesel and lamp oil, and that was a long time ago.

Koh Kaw Khao, just off Ban Nam Khem 20 KM north of Khao Lak. Endless deserted beaches, and quite a few hotels mostly concentrated at the southern tip. No low budget accomodation though. Koh Phra Thong, to be reached from Kuraburi pier, 70 KM north of Khao Lak. There are I believe two resorts, one of them is simple and cheap. Koh Ra, to be reached from the same pier, also has accomodation possibilities. Discover Phangnga province!

Do it yourself using the program Dreamweaver. Everybody can do it.

Cheapest option would be to go to Ranong by public bus, and go across to Burma and back. When you leave early you can easily do it in one day.

As far as I am concerned BP is heading the wrong way. Sorry to see outlook and especially database go. Instead of that we get supplements like guru, muze and brunch that go straight to the pile of waste paper I sell at the end of every month. These supplements are trying to be trendy, but people who are trendy will only laugh about it, and for people who are not trendy they also don't hold any interest.

This topic keeps popping up. Post in Thailand is hit and miss. Overseas-Thailand or the other way around normally takes 3 days up to 2 weeks. A letter I sent to New Zealand in November took 2 weeks to arrive. In your case, of course the new years weekend doesn't speed things up.

The cheap locally brewed drinking water in the approx. 0,9 liter bottles sometimes tastes of plastic a little bit. Always wondered if it would pass the test in Europe or the US.

It is normal that a savings account, at least one with little funds in it, is stopped after having been inactive for too long. When I was still living in Hua Hin, once I decided to revive a savings account which had been inactive for a long time. So armed with some cash I made my way to the Kasikorn Bank, where I was informed the account had been discontinued. But the 214 Baht that still had been in it, they handed over to me straight away. Once I agreed with a friend who went overseas for a long time, to keep his two bank accounts alive by transferring 500 Baht to both of them every 3 months.

Banks in Europe are doing the same thing though, inactive accounts with little money in it produce a loss for the bank, due to administration costs.

Not sure about insurance - its seems that if you're involved in an incident (or your unlucky/foolish enough to have stopped) with a Thai your screwed anyway. Perhaps it just lightens the blow...financially speaking.

Nonsense, based on hearsay and not on reality. With good insurance, if you're not to blame you're not screwed.

Seconded. This is one of the most persistent myths circulating among western tourists and residents.

Oh and for cheap monthly rental, try a company called airport car rent, contact details can be googled easily enough, and don't forget to apply your bargaining skills.

In Ranong,you could also go to the Club Andaman pier and leave your car in the parking lot there. There are boats going almost every hour, you could have lunch at Club Andaman or visit the casino. There is an immigration office at the pier. Club Andaman is on an island just inside Burma, before boarding the boat you'll be stamped out and coming back you'll be stamped in.

Thx for the reply. No, I don't have a plus account, just a free one, what are the advantages of a plus account? I will look into this. No, the company website is not under MSN, didn't know they offer this service. The website I made myself, and I pay a small yearly fee to keep it up. I know that often if you have a business you make yourself ridiculous using a hotmail or yahoo or even gmail account, but for my type of business (low budget hotel) this doesn't apply so much.

For my business, I depend on my hotmail account which I have had since 1999. Too many peopkle have it, and it is all over the internet. A problem I had sometimes lately is that sometimes mails I send do not arrive, so now I always check the "sent" folder after sending an email. More serious it would be if I wouldn't receive e-mails potential customers have sent.

I hope for some feedback from other hotmail users. The problems I have could also be due to the fact I am staying in a semi rural area, where the internet connection doesn't have silicon valley quality.