tomazbodner

He would continue conversation, at the end give you an honest score of your Thai abilities, which won't be 100% but maybe 60%. So if there are say 10 points to earn for Thai speaking, you'd get 6/10. And you'd need only another 54 in other categories to pass the required score. If you are earning over 100k/month, you obviously have a master degree if you're doing PhD, and these 2 alone will probably get you 2/3 of required points. Being polite, kind, have a nice personality and having good attitude towards Thailand and Thai people, staying in Thailand a long while, and you're already there or over the needed points. If you're in 40-45 age range, you're probably already over the needed threshold - even your Thai was 2/10. Stop worrying so much. Switch to using Thai when you talk to taxi driver, 7-11 and restaurant staff, engage in conversation with the people around your property or when you're outside. Ask friends to talk to you in Thai. If your child goes to school, he/she probably speaks Thai with schoolmates, so switch to Thai at home. I'm confident you can pass with just that. And nobody would judge you for using some English words in Thai, as long as you get the message across. Smile, wai, show respect, speak politely, khrab at the end of every sentence, don't talk <deleted> about Thailand (like so many posters in this forum), put some effort into improving language, which I am sure your Thai friends would love to help you with... And you'll be just fine.

But there's one that didn't fasten any...

But traffic cams will.

True. If I was dead it wouldn't help me much, either...

Absolutely agree.

Any suggestions, more realistic than bringing people back from the dead? I mean I'd love to bring that doctor from dead that was razed by speeding motorcop, but that kind of isn't really possible. Other than with invention of time machine, that's unlikely to change. So, what should the bank do? What should the contractor do?

Never seen any with solar panels on them? I think if the Sun goes out, you won't need a radio anymore.

I don't think bank would make contract with contractors without a penalty clause, in case they wreck something. As it seems contractor was the sloppy one causing this fiasco, you'd expect from bank to pay the damages to prevent lawsuit, and then squeeze blood out of the company breaking into the wrong house. It really isn't the problem of house owners how bank gets compensated by contractors, it was bank that hired them and should take responsibility. But being a state bank... who knows how this would play out. On the plus side - they got their house renovated (cleaned, repaired, repainted, etc.) I guess?

Interesting. Maybe upcountry bank officers don't know the rules? The above was quoted to me as Bank policy and just happened in 2020. Though my card didn't get chewed up, merely popped up a message saying that card is about to expire...

Are you saying that a state funeral should be held for environmental hero who was working hard on lowering our dependency on electricity?

Had a boss 20 years ago who had a step daughter... she was in hear early teens, maybe 12-13... when he and his wife were away, she took his car and went racing around the city with a couple of her about same aged friends. He had no idea until he'd returned. Luckily no accident happened, but just saying this isn't the first time something like that happened. Did parents know or not, we don't know. But regardless, there needs to be a severe punishment for this. Parents failed either mental fitness by allowing the kid to take car, or upbringing to make kid think it's OK to just take it. Consequences are there for all of them to now see.

Banks don't give loans for the houses to foreigners. You can buy house for cash, but you can't buy land that the house is standing on, as that must be owned by a Thai person, or a Thai company with at least 51% of ownership and voting rights in the name of Thais. So you buy a house which is sitting on some Thai's land, which you could only legally lease for 30 years, and any agreements longer than that are not in any way enforceable - so no back to back agreements. Sir, buying such a house is a definition of wasting money.

Was that before the law which stated that all the funds for purchase must come from abroad, or did the bank somehow get that sorted by bringing funds in? Krungsri is owned by MUFG which is Japanese, but I was not aware they were at all giving loans to foreigners, unless on PR, and even there they were only willing when buying directly from developer.

As a foreigner without a permanent residence, your options are very limited. If you are Singaporean, you can try UOB bank. Some others are offered loans by Bangkok Bank, but beware such loans are SGD/USD based, not in THB, and have considerably higher interest than local loans for Thais. The issue is that if you have no PR, all the funds must come from abroad for you to be able to own condo in your name. So local banks with exception of CIMB (not a great deal of lending from them that I'd notice), UOB and Bangkok Bank, other local banks do not have branches overseas. UOB loan is issued in Singapore and from what I know is only for Singaporean citizens. Bangkok Bank is issued in US, based in USD, but not sure whether only for US citizens. In either case, a transfer needs to be done into Thailand and the statement of funds from abroad needs to be presented to land office to register chanote (house registration) to your name as a foreigner. Without that, you won't be able to make a transfer. However if you are not Indian or Chinese (many of them apply each year so it's more difficult and expensive given 100 applications per nationality), speak some Thai, aren't in dire need of a condo right now, and can wait a few years, your job is stable and legal, you could apply for permanent residency in December, probably get it in a year to 18 months, wait a year or so, then knock on doors of Thai local banks (UOB, SCB, Krungsri) for a local loan. Difference in interest is large. Local loans are THB nominated with annual interest rates from about 3% per year up (before about 2.x% but they just got bumped up yesterday), vs. 10-15% per year and short repayment period for the "farang" loans. That's for first 3 years. After that it's higher but often Thais will refinance after 3 years. Not sure a foreigner can.

I didn't see this posted in here... China tells state banks to prepare for a massive dollar dump and yuan buying spree as Beijing's prior interventions have failed to stem its currency's worst year since 1994 The People's Bank of China has told major state-run banks to prepare to shed dollar holdings while snapping up offshore yuan, which has continued to fall despite prior interventions, sources told Reuters. From Business Insider

Had a conversation with BKK Bank HQ on this before - you can change your ATM at ANY branch, however, that's only true if all your documents are in order. If your passport has changed, you have to go to original branch where you opened the account as other branches won't be able to update your record. Now when you ask for new ATM card, you need to give them your documents to confirm your identity. Really only thing that's in the system is your passport number. If that's changed, then... well, sorry - go to original branch. But once that's updated, you can again use any branch. The original branch where I opened the account did mention I could have updated it at the HQ, but that wasn't mentioned in call with the HQ, so... maybe next time. Sideline comment: I had 1 year expired ATM card from KBank. But with updated documents. No problem to have a new one issued at another branch, even previous one expired.

Defamation laws suck but there are ways around them like the original article took... No, we're not telling you which bank, figure it out yourself... Wonder which one might look like that...

One of my bank accounts, driver's license, and True home internet are also registered with Pink ID. The others were opened before I even knew it existed, so they are opened with passport. Annoyance of course is that passports get full or expire, and you can't even get a new ATM card without first updating the information - which at least 2 of my banks require to be done at original branch where I first opened that account... That can be very far and inconvenient. But I changed PinkID as I moved address and the number is still the same. So that's quite a big benefit of it. So I fully agree with Peter's post above.

Should that not be apple juice? ????

Some IT shop like JIB or IT City in your area, or some seller around there on Kaidee?

You guys made me go and look at mine, and true - it is valid for 10 years. Apologies for misinformation earlier. As for the where they are valid - yes, as Peter says, people can travel anywhere, but need another means of identification, officially. See point 3 below (photo of the back of the Pink ID). Let me roughly translate: The person on this card isn't allowed to leave the area that issued the card except those who have alien identification certificate (passport would do here, I assume), or have written permission. Enforced? Unlikely. But this is already better than previous text (until a few years back) which had no "except" part at all...

As others have pointed out, you would need to be entered into Tabien Baan (blue one if permanent resident, yellow one if non-immigrant), before you can get a Pink ID, which can be issued immediately upon being entered into the house registration for another 60 baht, if I remember correctly. Pink ID is only valid in the province of issue. To travel outside that province, you would need to use your passport or some other identification. If number on the card doesn't start with 8, you might be asked to provide additional documentation even in the province (as Pink ID is valid for 5 years, but does not indicate immigration status).

But good part is if you apply, you'll have some time to go for a Thai course, or get private lessons, or just say you'll speak with people around you only in Thai and you might pick up enough in 6-9 months to pass it even you are a total beginner now. IT is a conversation. In my case it passed so quickly.... One of first questions was where I was from... After hearing my answer he was like... never heard of it. Then we spent the next ... don't even know how long as it was a really pleasant conversation so I lost track of time... 10? 15? 20? minutes about where he should visit if he goes there... that was the main guy with more medals than handed out at all Olympics combined... Overall it was great. No matter how stressed and worried I was about it beforehand.

I think you should not proceed, as all the risk is with you, and they own the place and can change the rules whenever they please. Best would be for your wife to check around the offers of the banks for housing loans (most are on the website, then you contact the bank and get their offers), where usually you talk to the person in charge of loans and can discuss details. Don't go with first bank that accepts it. Check some more and compare their offerings. As a foreigner taking loan, our options are very limited, expensive and only a handful of banks would even bother taking time to talk to us. But when it comes to Thais, the situation is quite different. If loan is in Thai name, that is. So you should at least go banking websites surfing with wife, find on forums comparison tables of current offers, then reach out to those that look most promising. Commercial banks might be easier to talk to than GHB/GSB (orange/pink) banks, they are usually more flexible and try to find a way. So try UOB, SCB, Krungsri, Kasikorn, maybe Bangkok Bank. Their websites would look like this: https://www.bangkokbank.com/en/Personal/My-Home Note - beyond opening pages, most information is in Thai. But banks are more flexible than what's written on websites. Good luck.