cliveshep

LINE - so long as both parties have internet both video and voice calls are unlimited and it's totally free. Best is, unlike my experiences with Skype years ago - it doesn't hang or freeze. My kids in the UK have it, it works world wide, and we do regular messaging and video calls, you can attach files, videos, pictures, you name it, works on smart phones and if you got it on your phone you can install on your pc and use your phone to log in so you got big screen access. Cannot speak too highly of LINE as being user friendly.

Totally disagree. For me the more skin the better. I'm in the Mike and Joelle camp here, all a man wants is for the woman to show up naked bringing food.

As the title says my Dell Latitude is probably 14 or 15 years old now, is giving me problems and needs replacing. I've nursed it along but in the last 9 years here it's had 2 new keyboards imported from Latvia of all places, a new HDD - big pain that was losing most of my files - new RAM, 3 replacement screens, replacement cooling fan, replacement USB ports (I didn't do those as they had to be soldered onto the motherboard) and has had to be stripped to a shell and cleaned twice. It now has developed a habit of hanging with message "not responding" which is annoying. It has got to go! I'm 79 so no more Dell's etc as it won't be me who gets use out of them. I read that a 500GB SSD is good, and 16GB ram and a Ryzen 7 CPU is also great. I also want 15.6 screen. Lazada got some seriously cheap new lappies from China, meaning under thb10000, the totally unheard of Mirval F7 range. That is not pocket money still but even so is cheap Chinese electronics but the specs are good and the AMD Ryzen7 5400 is reckoned to be very good. I don't do gaming, spend most days watching movies or YouTube, write occasional letters, and do internet banking, but I figure that so long as it has no spyware included with its OS (Windows 11 Pro) it's worth a punt. Has anyone bought one? If so does it perform ok? I figure most of it's bits are likely to be generic if it goes wrong - China making most pc bits for everyone these days.

Update - I made the 3rd application for the 90-day on 27th December, it came back yesterday 2nd January. Remembering it expired on 10th January this one expires on 27th March. So it's a 90-day report that we must apply for between 15 days before expiry to 7 days before, I figure that it ought to say report again before expiry on 10th March but no, it dates from date of application. So if I apply 15 days before expiry on all 4 applications per year that is a total of 60 days I am being deprived of, it becomes a 75 day notice effectively. Glad I don't rent a car or a building from these guys! They are trickier than a Thai Lawyer!

Hahaha - well done Dr Jack. Ok, got to say - I HATE frustration lol. To be fair, when I went in person with my lovely wife after the earlier refusal we rolled up at 8.30, it seemed the entire population of Myanmar, China, the UK, the US etc were already there. . I hunted for somewhere to sit waiting for my wife who was busy bribing an officer outside (no no, I didn't say that - honest) who let her park outside the entrance bless him. She came in to see this vast multitude and me sitting leaning on my walking stick, we walked to the entrance to the offices and by then I knew I'd never last out the waiting but the security officer saw me struggling and told us to come in immediately. We walked through, found the appropriate window to queue up at, only one Indian family and another farang in front, massive queues at the other windows. I presented my papers and my wife said why I was there and I got given a disabled card, an I.O officer came and led us off. It seems using a walking stick, plus being 79 are grounds for compassion - good because my hips and knees were killing me. So when I say I hate Immigration it was not my experience in person but their utterly crappy useless computer system the still needs a rain forest of paper and an online system that also needs some experienced hands to correct it's flaws. The people I met were lovely and I cannot praise them enough.

Look, it's Christmas, if you've got a belly ache try Imodium not negativity. I've already said I will go the 15-7 day route and reapply on 27th - ok?

No bl***y fear, I'm on a pension and have a family to support still, agents cost money.

Well, I think I was pretty clear on my reasons, reinforced by the IO actually printing on my TM47 receipt when I should reapply. It is still stuck on my fridge - "Re-apply BEFORE 24th December" is says. So I guess it is rocket science?

Absolutely, it's all in that category labelled "testicles" spelt boll..........you get the idea! I also miss the e-mail reminders, had to buy more fridge magnets lol!

Actually, I thought I had comprehensively explain in some detail why I did what I did when confusing information from the I.O and other Government web sites abounds. THEY don't seem to know what they want and I agree with you - on the face of it and the info on-line from CW it is indeed 15 - 7 days before BUT.......if I followed that and it was 15 WORKING days before I'd wind up sitting in CW most of the day after an exhausting 2 hour journey. Clear now?

Well, I posted "signed for" for years but a year ago decided to try online as members here said it was, after many years, working properly. Also posting involved driving into the outskirts of Bkk to a Post Office to get it stamped - wasting time and money so online was an attractive option. And to be fair, for most of the year it has worked perfectly and the time before expiry didn't become an issue until these last two renewals. Thai Immigration are masters of confusion - who to believe, the IO, sundry Government web sites or .......??

Last month my online 90 day report was rejected, no reason given, and after wasting much of the day and loads of petrol CW announced that my rejection was because my TM 30 had expired. Apparently I had not lived continuously in my home for the last 8 years although I had no recollection of living anywhere else but the IO's know best it seems. After getting a new one, I was allowed to accept graciously my TM47 and go home. BUT - I was instructed by the IO to apply for a new one online BEFORE 24th December as it expired 10th January. Math prodigies amongst you will note that is more than 15 days but the IO insisted she was correct in spite of me weakly wimpering "but but but......your CW web pages say apply in the window 15 days to 7 days before due date. Shot down in contempt for being a stupid old man and a foreigner to boot. So - I did what she said and applied on 12th December - email from the elementals running things said "application rejected" and included " This online application can be submitted 15 days in advance until the due date of notification." So I applied again on the 24th (yesterday) and today - rejected with same message. Ok - more than 15 days BUT on the Internet (Google clearly is NOT always your friend) the Immigration Dept said "15 WORKING days before." and 24th December is under 15 working days before 10th January. My 3rd attempt will now be made on the 27th December - wish me luck and hopefully whatever Gods control the TM47 renewals will grant the renewal. Meanwhile - Merry Chrimbo to all my long-suffering readers, those of you not too drunk to make it to the loo in time to avert embarrassment. Never mind - things dry quickly in this climate. Happy New Year to all in spite of taxation and excessively inflated baht rates!

So I'm on a UK State Pension, which my Thai wife and her two older sisters share as none of them has any income at all. Assuming that the Thai Authorities ignore the Double Taxation treaty with the UK (they cannot be trusted really can they?) I figure the safest way is to claim 4 x 150k tax free allowances by transferring 25% of my pension via WISE from my UK bank account to each one once a month. All of them will then have an income under the 150k a year threshold. The wife can keep her share to pay bills by bank transfer, I transfer to her from here anyway, I'll just do it from the UK. No tax due on that amount as 25% of my monthly pension is not a lot. The pension is not a lot, the UK are renowned in Europe for the smallest pensions anyway, pensioners get a choice of starve or keep warm and some years back so many froze to death in their homes that following a national outcry the Government gave all eligible pensioners a Winter Fuel allowance, not a lot but it helped. You Americans now got yourselves a Trump, we Brits got ourselves a Keir Starmer as PM and a Labour Government, So the first thing Herr Starmer did was shout "Sieg Heil" (they got elected after 16 years of Conservative rule) and cancel Winter Fuel payments with immediate effect to release money to pay demands by the Rail workers Union who were threatening strike action. Labour love Unions, these workers already get £70,000 plus a year, pensioners up to £12,000 a year which is still taxed. So dividing that by 4 means none of us get past the Thai Tax free pay threshold. The sisters can keep their normal allowance from me and give the rest back in cash we can use to pay bills. It will cost a mere £100 or so extra in WISE fees a year to send it in 4 parts - peanuts. We can pay the utility bills cash in Big C if necessary.

Help needed please - a contact number for a reasonable mobile, i.e comes to my home - car mechanic in Khlong Sam Wa Tawan Ok. Job is simple and if I was more fit I'd do it myself. It is to adjust valve lash otherwise known as tappet clearances on a Suzuki Carry truck. Truck is under cover, I got the valve-cover gasket, plug tube seals and dielectric grease for plug caps. I also got a compressor and all the tools so just need the man or woman to do the job competently. I also got metric and imperial feeler gauges - no need for fag packets, and the correct gaps for inlet and exhaust in both thou of an inch or decimal parts of mm. Anyone know of someone capable near me they can put me in touch with? It is sounding like an ancient Ford tractor right now!

Update - went to CM and because of age and bad legs got a priority ticket and taken into a booth. One other guy getting chemo in hospital was also there. So showed the IO the paper and said WHY was I rejected. She said you got to apply BEFORE 15 days. So I said but but but in your own CM manual it clearly gives a 7 day window from 15 days to 7 days before expiry. No she says, must be in the few days before the 15 day before expiry. After 15 days it will be rejected. Then looks at my TM30 in my passport. Says this has expired. Rubbish I say, it is not a licence or a limited period item, your laws say if I spend one night away from home in a hotel the hotel must fill in a TM 30 and when I get home my wife must also fill in a TM 30 BUT I say I have not been away from home since the date of the one in the passport. No says entitled I.O - its expired and you need new one. But I am not the one to fill the form in, so poor wife has to get sundry papers to prove who she is and where she lives and fill in forms whereupon I get a little slip stapled into my passport. Need to do it again in one year says I.O as it expires. Gives me TM47 receipt after filling in another TM47 form. It is a stupid system, fill in application for TM67, they acknowledge receipt of details so I have complied with the law in telling them where I live. They then refuse to accept that until they issue a receipt or as we have seen reject it yet law has been complied with - they have been notified, just turn an official blind eye to the notification if it suits them. Clearly also the I.O's don't even read their own manual which according to a note on the top of the paper says it is issued by CM. So really no excuse for insisting on different date and time rules. If the system refuses me again in 90 days less 15 - 17 days I'll post another one straight away. F***k struggling through traffic to CM and being unable to park because of the eternal roadworks just because of a moronic system where even the I.O's. ignore their own system and make up their own rules. Pressed all my angry and frustrated buttons this fiasco has, totally unnecessary. If I was criminally minded I would not bother to fill in any of their forms and just live quietly under the radar and chances are they'd never find out until I died. I'm trapped because I am law-abiding trying to live under constantly changing rules and entitled I.O's.

Given the comment about syncing TM 30 - I assume THAT doesn't expire does it? Not done one of those for a few years and as never been away from home overnight don't need to since the 1st one when we bought current home and stopped renting.

Atari 64? Oh dear, do wonder I'm in the doo-doo then.

They apparently never explain themselves or give reasons and they didn't this time. The guidance manual does say top right it is a CW document but they are the main one anyway aren't they? As the document clearly shows only a 7 day window and I submitted one day outside that I assume that is the reason for the rejection.

So if doing the 90 day report online one only has a 7 day window - outside of that any notification will automatically be rejected. This is total ordure. WTF is wrong with these people? I and my wife got to drag in a 2hr journey now to CW because my last application was rejected - due on 10th and made all innocent of their changes on the 4th. Had they actually let me know with their acceptance of my application at the time I could have posted it as I used to do. Also as I have problems walking it is far from a joke as CW involves walking and standing around. I'll go in tomorrow reluctantly as my hips and back will cause endless misery for days after. The changes and restrictions are something for everyone to take note of - well done Howerde for linking this. I'll link it again to emphasise and stop others getting caught out by the I.O's sudden change. https://bangkok.immigration.go.th/en/tm47online-manual/

For information - my age precludes donation of my body and even if it did not being overweight with hypertension also would have precluded it. I think I'll have to consider putting the lot into her personal a/c as soon as it is transferred from the UK every month and get it put back 2 months before extension of stay. So long as she keeps a tight rein on spending it should work as she is quite trustworthy albeit spends money if she can as any woman does. Preferable of course is to withdraw from my account straight away and not tell the bank I'm dead but if authorities do check and match date and time she could be in a world of grief and that scares her. Side note - does the 400,000 have to be in a bank or could it conceivably be in cash for Immigration?

Many thanks to all the members who responded. To address some points or questions:- I made a will, got a Government official plus SIL to sign and date every page as a witness and signed every page myself. There are two copies. I used a modified standard Thai will form, modifications being to simply delete non-applicable clauses, keeping it simple. It is written in both Thai and English and translations have been checked. My wife has both copies and it clearly states that she is the sole beneficiary and that I have instructed her to clear my account on my death. I also clearly state that she has my pin numbers and passwords and has done for the last 10 years and that there are no other beneficiaries except her and my grown adult kids have rejected all claims. I do all my banking on-line, both UK bank which holds very little and my Bangkok Bank account. She has passwords and pin numbers to both accounts and the records will show that all transfers - and there are many every month - are made to her alone, I've told her to carry on the transfers until the account is empty. I make no other payments except one payment to her family monthly, all bills she pays - I transfer money, she pays. The reason is as she explained years ago - little money is ever left in her account, if I were to lose my bank card or an ATM scammed me we'd be stuffed, by only paying her by internet transfers my account is protected. I use a computer, not a mobile phone which I feel cannot be trusted in security terms. I have considered a joint account but feel it is probably better to let her do internet transfers and only after she has done them to call whoever she has to call over my case. My set limits for transfers are daily 0.5 million and 450,000 on internet transfer so she'll only need to do one and if God is gracious and I can still do it before last gasp even better. I think prepaying the company as Sheryl has suggested is a great idea and I copied that excellent post to my (LEGAL) wife (we were married in a UK Church) and will get her to make enquiries. If they were to undertake to do everything that would be great for my wife.

I'm 78, realistically my time is limited. I'm concerned about my wife being in trouble when I die, we got the 400,000 assuming she can get hold of it, she is a signatory on the account - seen under UV light on the book, but not sure if she can transfer the money legally if I'm dead. So does anyone know if she transfers my money to her own account using my laptop as we do all the time is it legal after my death, it's certainly legal when I'm alive. Next advice - she says it will cost most of that amount to dispose of my body and that is exorbitant - all she needs is the cheapest cremation, no monks wailing or chanting, no food, no flowers, we are both Christian but it seems that it is only in a temple that a body can be cremated. So advice please, we live on my UK pension and they are not generous, far from it!

O(k guys - update here. Went in last week with 2 sets of everything just in case. Asked the document checking "lady"(boy) if two sets were needed - answer yes. So got bank letter, two copies of that, two copies of updated bank book's last page, 2 copies of their extra 3 pages of forms about if I over-stayed yabba yabba and for wife asserting yes still married etc, presented these two massive 30 page bundles and were told we would be called. Well, we were not called and in the end thoroughly fed up because we were on-site in plenty of time for our appointment, but now long past that time and found an empty booth with an IO sitting in it and asked her why others were now in front when we were missed out. She looked at our appointment form, took our bundles of docs and said she'd do it for us. First thing she did was hand back one bundle - not need she said. But but but we said - doc checking told us....yes she said but I don't need 2 sets, they are wrong! So whether right or wrong she took one set, yakked and joked with my wife, then called us to go inside to a supervisor who simply handed back my passport and said finished! What says I? No sweetie? (like dentists do for children!) So she laughed and joked could I still chew candies if I had my teeth still when the I.O who did the paper work shushed her saying she'd offend me but as I laughed they laughed and all went good. Also good because the booth we were supposed to to in was staffed by a right miserable I.O my wife remembered from last year as rude so we didn't need to sit in front of her! So go back for extension stamp on 5th April now. All over for another year!

I always scan all documents and print them out in colour producing one legible set for my annual extension but last year they upset my wife by demanding an additional set in black & white at Chang Wattana. She got mad because she is the one to go downstairs to get 25 pages of copies, which by the way, are as usual almost indecipherable with pictures mostly blacked out of details. As we had a booking time this made us late. We were not the only ones caught out by this, lots of disgruntled ex-pats vocalising their thoughts on the Thai Imm Service which were far from complimentary. I did not disagree! So my question is - in order to prepare now and not get caught out again - is this now a requirement of the Imm Bureau as when printing I can always print a legible set in B & W so the I.O's are happy bunnies? I.e two sets, one of which (if not both) must be in black and white?

Why would you pay for a free site when you can download ad-free using Clip Grab? Anyway - confession time - lack of comments button etc is/was my fault as for some reason I must have increased the screen magnification and YouTube retained the setting. Made the magnification less and hey presto I got comments etc back again. I only found this out while accessing the site from Firefox instead of Opera because I wanted to make a comment and deciding the font was too small increased magnification whereupon the comments section and button vanished. Decreasing magnification on Opera restored it too.