KittenKong

15 minutes ago, abraxton said:

For example, if you use UBER in the United States when a driver has a score 1-3.9 (3.0 - 3.9  - which you would consider to be average acceptable performance ) - the company perceives that driver as deficient subject to de-activation.  And once de-activated there is no quick or standard way to resolve any problems.  The rider/customer is never told what those numbers represent  - only that 1 is low and 5 is high.  As a Grab user here I always give my driver a 5 star rating unless something is significantly out of line and within the driver's control (speeding, dirty car, loud music...). 

Fair enough. I don't actually use taxis myself so the issue doesn't really arise. For hotels and restaurants I generally only bother to make a rating if it is something other than my idea of "average", so even if I did ever use Grab I would probably also not rate at all unless the experience was unusually good or unusually bad. That seems to fit with their rating system.

17 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

That's mean spirited in the Uber type culture. Most people only grade down if there was a serious fault. Yes it's inflated but in real life if a driver or customer after a high volume of ratings has a 4 then it usually means they seriously suck.

So scores of 1 - 3 are entirely meaningless? Perhaps best just to stick with a binary option then: good and bad. ✅ + ❎

Uber isnt alone in this nonsense as most hotel/restaurant review sites are the same. I tire of seeing scores of 80% awarded and then reading "this place was pretty bad and I wont be going back".

But am I mean-spirited? No, just precise.

There is rarely any sort of queue when I pull into service stations here. In fact I am often the only customer. What am I doing wrong?

13 hours ago, Jingthing said:

Just as with the grab car service you are asked to rate the drivers. I always rate 5. They would probably have to vomit in my food to get a 4. Seems the least I can do. I assume they are probably rating customers too. I'm not confident I'm always getting 5s with that restaurant confirmation business.

When ask to rate anything out of 5 I always work on the principle that 3 is average or standard. To award 4 or 5 requires something exceptional.

3 hours ago, tomazbodner said:

It's easy to dry clothes outside dryer during the dry season, on a hot, sunny day. However in rainy season when humidity is condensing on the walls outside, dryer is very handy. But it takes time. The classic looking LG took about 2 hours, and depending on the load, Hitachi takes about 1-1.5 hours to dry most loads. Admittedly if I took them out on a dry day, and placed under ceiling fan they'd be dry in half an hour. If I put them outside though, they'd be dry in 15 minutes, get some gray tan and go straight back to washer. Beauty of living in the middle of a polluted city.

I dont really have those problems in Jomtien but I can understand that people do in other parts of Thailand.

If it's raining here when I do my laundry I just hang things up inside where they dry within an hour or two also.

My washing dries in about 10 minutes on my condo balcony. I dont really see the need for any sort of dryer.

42 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

USD 1 year term saving account in a Cambodian bank can get you 6%

If that was the whole story then all the spare USD in the world would be deposited in Cambodian banks.

Clearly if Cambodian banks are paying way over the odds there must be some downside to it.

32 minutes ago, Destiny1990 said:

You miss his point that seafront units of 42 sqm go on market for 8500 MONTHLY.

Instead u whining illegal units.??

 

View Talay 2 is sea-view, not sea-front.

But there can be no doubt that rental asking prices have dropped significantly in just about every building over the last couple of years. And with more buildings coming the trend is likely to be downwards.

If you go into settings and tick the option "force layout for mobile devices" you get an interface that is much easier to use on a PC than the regular PC interface is. It seems to be impossible to view programme lists in the guide in the regular interface without pulling the page from side to side, which is very tedious to do with a mouse and even worse with an air-mouse.

The mobile layout when used on a PC shows all the programmes from one channel on one day in a long list with no clutter, which is what I want. Sadly they didnt bother to test the CSS and that layout does not work properly on Firefox so you have to use Chrome.

1 hour ago, kiniyow said:

View Talay 8 is only half sold and over 5 Yrs old yet we are to believe this is already 87% sold out?

View Talay units are sold as shells by the developer. This is no longer a very popular way of buying and most people these days seem to prefer units that are at least finished if not furnished.

Finishing a shell can be very expensive and tedious here, though of course you do end up with something that entirely suits your own tastes. It will probably also be of higher quality, if you have paid attention to what is done.

The availability of credit may also be a factor.

You misunderstand the rule. The rule does not prohibit people from altering the exterior view of the building, it just prohibits such changes being authorised by fewer than half the co-ownership.

6 hours ago, meand said:

I can't imagine if he spoke respectfully to them and brought in the contractor he would not be able to do the windows. How is changing a window any different than hanging newspapers in the window as far as changing appearances and devaluing? 

In some buildings you would not be allowed to hang newspapers either, and rightly so in my opinion. Hanging laundry on balconies is also not permitted in better buildings.

3 hours ago, Delight said:

However a section entitled 'Co -owner behaviour' can be changed at a general co -owner meeting with a  simple vote to approve.

I see no such reference.

3 hours ago, smutcakes said:

You can umm and ahh as flap as much as you want. The simple amswer is you are not allowed to do anything which affects the external visual aspect of the building. Ask anyone who knows anything about the condo act. The section looks pretty unequivocal to me.

No, it just says that some such issues require particularly high voting numbers in order to approve them. It doesnt actually ban them at all and if a suitable number of co-owners are in favour then they can go ahead.

23 minutes ago, snoop1130 said:

The total Bt9 billion subsidy would make per-unit FT charge drop to Bt11.60, reducing from the Bt16.82 between May and August.

The FT adjustment on my May and June bills is 0.1160B per unit (not 11.60B) so I dont see where the 16.82 (presumably actually 0.1682B) mentioned comes from.

Besides which the FT is applied as a negative adjustment so to go from 16 to 11 (or 0.16 to 0.11) would in fact be an increase anyway.

1 hour ago, Mavideol said:

management is or must be Thai, juristic is or must be Thai, no rules and regulations no by laws,

Management can be a farang-run company and farangs can also be employed as building managers and as JPM, though permits may be required. All buildings should have some sort of by-laws though they may not be very well written. The Condo Act also always applies though it is hard to enforce.

24 minutes ago, smutcakes said:

Section 48 (3)

I would say that is more to do with the quorum/majority needed to alter the internal by-laws, as I mentioned. It doesn't actually prohibit any actions.

41 minutes ago, Kim J said:

40bt to exchange full for empty bottle. I think the deposit on the bottles was 300bt each but was some time ago so can not be certain. They come every Wednesday and Saturday regular as clockwork. If you get caught out and need a special delivery not on your scheduled day a simple phone call and they are soon there.

Sounds very similar to mine, though my bottle deposit was 200B.

3 hours ago, ezzra said:

First of all, they should have a printed Rules and regulations booklet of your condo, if in thai only, ask to have it translated, it's your right, second, Ask to speak to juristic person manager of the building, he's the last word as what allowed and what not, ask him for clarifications regarding the buildings rules and regulations,

Yes, all buildings should have rules as these are decided at the first GM after a building is declared to be a condo. Most buildings seem to have a pretty standard list of copy/pasted rules though some of the better ones have a much more extensive list, that someone actually gave some thought to. Notably items like "no short-term rentals".

The final arbiter is actually the committee - who are the elected representatives of co-owners - rather than the JPM, though the JPM does have the power to act in his own stead if the matter threatens the safety or integrity of the building. I dont think that changing window colours would really fall into that category.

So the actual decision of what constitutes a visible change is probably down to the committee but even the committee has to abide by whatever the by-laws say about the matter, if anything. If necessary it can be taken to a GM for co-owner confirmation. A GM can also modify the by-laws permanently though this requires a very large quorum.

So I would say that it all depends on what is meant by "small and not really visible".