maisodni

Think about what 25 million additional tourists per year means. Even if you assume five persons per room (!!), if a visitor stays one week in Thailand on average, that mean the number of required room nights for first night of visit is (25,000,000 divided by 5 = 5,000,000 rooms - divided by 365 days = 13,698 rooms per first night, on average. But - to cover a one week stay by each visitor - you need seven times that many rooms. That would be 480 hotels, with 200 rooms each, full to the brim.

If you put just 2.5 persons per room (?), that would mean that you need almost 1,000 hotels - at 200 rooms each, to hold the additional influx

There is opportunity there - for construction employment, hotel employment, and employment to provide all the goods and services needed - but it will also put a lot of strain on a country with only 68,000,000 citizens.

MS

They have reversed the process. I ran into the exact same thing a week ago. Now you get your work permit first, then your work visa, then register your employees. I did this and now have both my work permit and non b visa from Penang as of yesterday afternoon. Now I have a years time to register 4 Thai employees before my work permit needs to be renewed.

Thanks - your response was the only one that directly addressed the situation, and told me something useful and relevant to a CHANGE that has evidently occurred in February 2015. Everyone else's answers were based on old practice.

Cheers!

MS

No - my comment about banking was in relation to needing company account to deposit share capital funds into, such that lease deposit, recruiting fees, furniture purchase, etc can be accomplished in a way that expense can be paid by check (or local bank transfer), the flow of funds can be reviewed by an end-of-year auditor, and there is no need to carry around large amounts of cash.

Based on some more investigation, it appears that Social Fund department has decided to go on a rampage - and has already refused to accept registration of employees for social fund for some 40 recently incorporated companies - saying that they were suspicious about the validity of the employment of these individuals.

If true, and continuing, this will effectively mean no more work permits for newly started companies, until they have four Thai employees actively working at the registered office address, and pass Social Fund inspection.

If this is true, I'm sure there will be more dicsussion developing aout this issue.

MS

New company - need four Thai employees to support application for WP.3 form. Come up with four Thais, gather ID and hospital info, give 4 x 900 baht to service provider to pay first month SF tax at time of SF registration for company, and for its first four Thai employees.

SF office says "no deal" - we are referring this case to our legal department (?), who will inspect the company office address first. Since when does this happen?

Without work permit, no bank account; without bank account; no lease deposit for real office; with no real office, no place to put real employees. So - right now, just serviced office virtual address, and "outdoor" employees (moto taxi drivers).

I am not looking for speculative answers. I am intersdted only in success stories from people who have "found the pattern and the solution" - in 2015.

As far as I know, this new "problem scenario" has just erupted starting this week.

Thanks,

MS

Everyone is quick to pillory Bitcoin, everytime some scam artist walks off with few million dollars worth of Bitcoins. Bitcoins were "invented" in 2008, the Bitcoin protocol was first published in 2009, and the first commercail purchase of anaything (a pizza) occurred in May 2010 - and Bitcoin first exceeded US $1 in value in 2011. So - at most - operators have had less than five years to figure out how to "get things right" with this digital crypto-technology.

Paper/"fiat" currencies have been around for about 600 years, and scams have been going on continually and prodigiously ever ssince - but no one sreams about national currencise being a scam.

"Paper money" had some growing pains, in its early days, as Marco Polo experienced first-hand:

http://youtu.be/NSwkGiZq6rU

Cheers,

MS

Bitcoin may be a losers game, or be doomed to failure. But - the world fiat money system is GUARANTEED to collapse within a few years, as a mathematical certainty - mainly due to gross fraud and manipulation by the United States Federal Resrve system, which will drag the whole word under, at some point.

Could you post a copy of that guarantee...I want to see if you read it right. Thanks.

Well: http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2014/01/17/you-think-the-deficit-is-bad-federal-unfunded-liabilities-exceed-127-trillion/

Since the entire world economy is $78 trillion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_economy), I'd say hat there is an insoluble problem there.

But - that' s just me.

MS

And just yesterday someone here was recommending Bitcoin as an investment lol

Any frauds or losses involving Bitrcoin over the six years that it has existed are just "chump change" or rounding errors, in comparison to thousasnds of years of frauds involving fiat currencies, and thefts of currencies and precious metals. Just for example:

Enron - Share price goes goes from US $90.75 in mid-2000 to less than $1 by November 2001 - followed by a US $63.4 BILLION bankruptcy filing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enron_scandal Do you blame the US dollar for that loss?

Parmalat - Italian milk company. Collapsed into US €14 BILLION bankruptcy due to accounting fraud - 2003 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parmalat_bankruptcy_timeline Do you blame the Euro for that loss?

Viktor Lustig - 1925 - Posing as a government official, he "sold" the Eifel Tower to several diffferent Parisian scrap metal dealers, by picking up a bit over US $200,000 in bribes to steer the winning bid (on a non-existent scrapping project) their way. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Lustig Do you blame the French Franc?

Closer to home, how about Nick Leeson, Barings Bank, Singapore, 1995. Loss of £827 million (US $1.4 BILLION), resulting in the insolvency of Barings Bank. Do you blame the British Pound for that loss?

Ahh, but precious metals - gold - that's a safe sector, right? Well, it is until people start passing off gold-plated tungsten bars as "pure gold": http://ausbullion.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/tungsten-filled-gold-bars.html http://www.zerohedge.com/article/german-prosieben-tv-channel-finds-500-gram-tungsten-bar-wcheraeus-gold-foundary-bank-origin http://www.myfoxny.com/story/19578206/fake-gold-bars-turn-up-in-manhattan

Crooks exist in every niche of any and all financial-related markets. Everyone beats up on Bitcoin because it is "different" in a way that many people cannot understand.

Bitcoin may be a losers game, or be doomed to failure. But - the world fiat money system is GUARANTEED to collapse within a few years, as a mathematical certainty - mainly due to gross fraud and manipulation by the United States Federal Resrve system, which will drag the whole word under, at some point.

Cheers!

MS

Here is the reality: The Thai government institution that would presumably have authority and responsibility for regulating Bitcoin would be the Bank of Thailand.

The Bank of Thailand could exercise jurisdiction over Bitcoin in any of three ways:

1. By declaring it as "legal tender" - in which case it could be used to settle debts/obligations, and it could not be refused.

2. By declaring it to be a foreign currency - in which case they could regulate trade in it under their authority to issue foreign exchange licenses.

3. By declaring it as a permissable tool for delivering overseas foreign remittance services - in which case they could regulate trade in it under their authority to license foreign remittance service providers.

The BOT chose to:

1. Declare Bitcoin to not be legal tender in Thailand.

2. Declare Bitcoin to not be a foreign currency, and not allow Bitcoin to traded for foreign currency within Thailand.

3. Prohibit licensed foreign remittance services from promoting Bitcoin as their method of accomplishing outbound transfers.

By taking these three positions, they effectively said: we decline to become involved with Bitcoin, by keeping it isolated from our areas of responsibility and authority.

The direct text of all Bank of Thailand announcements related to Bitcoin may be found in the PDF files that may be downloaded (from bottom of the page) at: http://www.bitcoinrealmthai.com/thai-government-regulation-bitcoin-trading/

Cheers,

MS

Report it to fbi bitcoins are forbidden and banned in thailand

This is not at all true. You should not make comments when you don't know what you are talking about. If you live in Thailand, you just committed several crimes - defamation, and also a violation of Computer Crimes Act.

What is correct is - www.bahtcoin.com was not operated legally, or by a legitimate company. The same goes for all business conducted in Thailand using localbitcoins.com - that is illegal activity.

There are only two fully-legal, tax-registered Bitcoin exchanges in Thailand, operated by registered companies, with proper E-commerce licenses from Ministry of Commerce:

http://www.bitcoin.co.th and http://www.coins.co.th

I am attaching copies of their E-commerce registration certificates:

Por Kor 0403 Form (E-Commerce Registration Certificate) - Thai.PDF

e-commerce.pdf

A company can always file a company registration change to modify shareholdings, and company may apply for Amity Treaty registration at any time that it becomes eligible to do so.

If you start as an LP without Amity Teaty. then you must be the minority (limited libaility) shareholder, without signature power. Only the manging partner (Thai majority shareholder, with unlimited personal liability) can have signature authority for the business.

I will not address the preliminary shareholder arrangement that you mention, because such arrangements are illegal, and such discussion violates the T&C of this forum.

For Amity Treaty - one thing to be wary of is that some legal services providers (including a major advertiser on this forum) incorrerctly advise that a business must have 3,000,000 baht registered capital to apply for Amity Treaty. This is flatly incorrect - the correct requirement is 2,000,000 baht registered capital - because an approved Amity Treaty company receives a Foreign Busines CERTIFICATE (2,000,000 baht to be eligible), not a Foreign Business LICENSE (which requires 3,000,000 baht to be eligible).

MS

The way they demolish buildings here is from the top down, one cubic meter at a time. No cat is going to get crushed. Be made homeless, yes. Crushed, no.

From my own experience, back in 2011 - if your packet is complete with everything else - and you are ONLY missing the criminal records check results from your home country, you can still apply - you just need a photocopy of your REQUEST for criminal records check, plus the postal or courier payment receipt.

I requested criminal records check from USA at start of October. The results came back in April. Immigration still accepted my PR application in December. My appiication packet was actually forwarded from Immigration to Ministry of the Interior in September 2012.

Cheers!
MS

Violent crime against westerners outside of the hours 11:00 pm to 6:00 am is almost non-existent here. Pickpocketing and purse snatching exist, but that is the case in virtually every city of this size on earth. If you are drunk, with gold chains hanging off you, wandering some side soi at 3:00 am - the law of the jungle will manifest itself - and you will probably be relieved of your gold. Otherwise, if you look alert, and keep your wits about you - predators will go looking for easier prey - which usually means tourists.

A woman does have to be a bit more circumspect about moving around solo at night, via taxi - my suggestion would be to find a place to live within walking distance of a BTS or MRT stop, and go home early enough to catch the last train (roughly midnight).

The reports of police stops were - in my opinion - vastly overblown - and I say that as someone who walked along/through the most frequently sighted intersection almost every weekday evening for the past 12 years. Maybe one in 2,000 foreign passersby got stopped - during maybe a one-week "surge" every four or five months - for years. Then - starting maybe five months ago - the military government shut down a lot of the sidewalk business activity along Sukhumvit - and the Police - having fewer opportunities to exploit the street bars, vendors, etc., stepped up their activity stopping random foreigners for maybe six weeks. Of every 100 foreigners stopped, probably 95 were inconvenienced for five minutes or less, with no ill effects. If urine testing occurred, I doubt that even 20 people - total - were ever affected. If drugs were planted - that might have happened maybe once or twice in ten years - and somewhere else (like Ekkamai bus station). If they ever stopped a 26 year old western woman dressed in "business casual" along Sukhumvit - neither I nor anyone I know ever heard of it.

95% of all bad stuff that happens to foreigners here happens between midnight and sunrise. If you are habitually out during that period, you number will eventually come up. If you avoid being out frequently during that period, your chances of running into problems are minimal.

MS

They seem to report only 1 terrorist.

Nearly reaching the 12 hour point. Dangerous time as his tiredness will start to effect his thought patterns. He has nobody backing him up and can't even rest.

I have been hoping that an Australian SAS assault team has been getting some good, restful sleep this afternoon and evening, before paying a "sandman" visit to the sleepy scumbag terrorist - say about 4:15 am tomorrow morning.

May said scumbag enjoy a long, loooonnnngg - very L-O-N-G dirt nap.

MS

RajeshNL - Possibly you met with Phu Gong Nid, the head of the PR section. She indicated that there is no longer any official at Ministry of Interior that has authority to either approve existing applications, or publish the order to open up a new application window. So - nothing proceeds.

MS

I have worked on Soi Asok for eleven years - always walking to and from Asok BTS/Sukhumvit MRT - and often - around quitting time, walking to Sukhumvit, and then down to Phrom Pong area - sometimes heading to Sukhumvit on Soi 21, and sometimes on Soi 23. I have never been stopped in that area - I was stopped and searched briefly once - around 2006 - in-between Soi 24 and 26 - around 4:30 pm one day. In passing, I have seen maybe ten stop-and search incidents for pedestrians - with no common profile apparent - maybe four of those in the past six months.

Now - here are two things to consider:

1. Maybe 600 westerners pass through that high-traffic intersection area every hour (that's ten per minute - the number might be a lot higher) - so make that 8,000+ per fourteen hour day, between noon and 2:00 am. Let's say that maybe ten get stopped per day. That's one in 800. You can pick your numbers - but the chance of any one person being stopped is very low.

2. I said I've seen ten maybe ten stop and searches. I've heard first-hand of maybe twenty more. I've read about maybe another fifty. That's 80 - in eleven years. Well, in those same eleven years, I heard of maybe 300 instances of pickpocketing - and I remember when Katoey thieves used to position themselves at night, at the one pedestrian bridge between Sois 23 and 25 - and I had to bark and menace aggressively to get them to back off - and I've heard of maybe 70 or 80 instances of purse or bag-snatchings in the Asok/Sukhumvit area, by motorcycle pillion riders - and I have not heard about a single one of either of those cases in the past six months., So - increased police presence means reduced pick-pocketing and bag-snatching - but with an increased incidence of police stop and search. I think 95% of stop and search cases are over and done with in three minutes - with no lasting harm. Better to be slightly inconvenienced, than to be definitely robbed.

My two cents.,

MS

I use the Royal Oak in soi 33 at Sukhumvit - food and drink good and used by farang and Thai alike. They have quiz night on Wednesday night, if you are in to that.The ladies serving are friendly and offer good service.

This is my favorite pub as well. But - it is fairly cliquish - a good place to be a regular, but perhaps a bit cold to strangers.

One thing for sure - you could walk up and down Sukhumvit Soi 33 until your shoes wore out, and you would NEVER find it - because it is not on Soi 33 - it is on Soi 33/1 - about 150 meters from Soi 33. Robin Hood on the corner, then the Dubliner Pub another 30 meters into the Soi, and then - 50 meters farther into the Soi, the Royal Oak Pub - at the site formerly occupied by the Bulls Head Pub.

Brewdog Punk IPA on draft - that's what brings me in.

MS

From a very intense time in the USA:

http://youtu.be/TEttspEq3Vw

Friends,

1) I am almost done with documents preparation for Thai PR application, Did the immigration announced period of application submission for 2014?

2) Just saw some comments kinda 'getting citizenship is much easier' is it so?

There will not be an application period this year, just as there were no applications accepted in 2010.

I run a business services company, and my staff liaison worker who deals with Immigration, confirmed this situation with the appropriate officials at that location.

MS

The applicable law is Sections 118 and 119 at http://thailaws.com/law/t_laws/tlaw0132a.pdf

MS

Thus far the only new rule that has been announced - and which becomes effective 5 January 2015 - is that any company that incorporates with, or increases capital above 5,000,000 baht will have 15 days to provide bank certification that the full amount of new capital has been remitted to a bank account in the company name. The exact implementation instructions or this rule change have not yet been announced.

MS

See: http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/74654-cameratas-guide-to-the-permanent-residence-process/

You can get most required info at http://www.immigration.go.th/nov2004/en/base.php?page=residence

In past years, the Interior Ministry made an announcement in late November, "opening up" the application period for that year - which usually started between 11 and 14 December, and ran until the end of December.

But - there evidently will not be an application period in 2014 - just as there were no applications accepted in 2010. So - you have a full year to prepare.

As an American, your hardest (and longest lead time) action will be getting the criminal records check from USA - which requires that you get fingerprinted in Thailand, on an FBI form (FD-258 Fingerprint Card) that you can download - and you must then send it off to an FBI Processing center in West Virginia. It takes them about four months to send you the clearance certificate. See: http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/identity-history-summary-checks When I applied, I got myself fingerprinted at the Prakhanong Police Station - at no cost (and they would not even accept a "tip" that I wanted to leave).

You also need a medical exam performed at a Government Hospital - I got mine at Police General Hospital at Ratchaprasong - and again, there was no charge.

You may just be facing a timing problem. Most Thai employers have some sort of annual bonus program. Those that do tend to either pay bonus at end of year (late December, or early January), or at Chinese New Year (which - in 2015 - will be around 15 February). A typical bonus might be an extra month's pay.

So - it is often hard to recruit anyone who is already working, near the end of the year. That leaves candidates that are presently not employed - and that is often not a very attractive population from which to draw compelling candidates.

MS