Scouse123

10 hours ago, OnTheRun said:

Moron? A bit harsh, these masks that leak the covid virus through like water in a collander, before you get too upset I wear these totally inadequate masks to go with the flow in the full knowledge they are totally useless.

Well great for you. I hope it works out.

I can only report back in honesty what they told us

Hi guys,

I said I would report back to you because you took the time and trouble to assist me.

I know my Thai  language skills are fine after all these years, but I went home and double checked just in case I was wrong regards my conversation at the post office

My lady contacted the postmaster who she knows on a personal level. He informed her that no mail was leaving for foreign shores at the moment, or at least from their post office.

Now, I do not know if this is correct or not but I am certainly not upsetting anybody at the moment in officialdom. Nope, not scared, but tempers are frayed.

Good news for me, Guernsey have responded very positively and stated they will NOW accept signed, stamped and dated scanned copies and are prepared to help in these uncertain times.

Regards DHL, They were telling me it is getting blocked, scanned all over the place and things are going missing because it is happening at the receiving end as well. A bit of meltdown.

Thanks everyone.

2 hours ago, Oxx said:

If the OP was trying EMS, Thailand Post doesn't do EMS to the Channel Islands.  (Last year they accepted some urgent documents for Guernsey.  I was told a couple of weeks later that they had been returned to the regional post office where I could collect them because Guernsey wasn't serviced.  Something to do with an international postal agreement in which the Channel Islands weren't participants.  A few weeks later I had to go back to the post office to receive a partial refund.)

Hi,

Thanks, that is the place Guernsey, I was sending the documents to.

I will check and try other methods offered by you guys and report back.

Thank you all people, great help to me.

Gents,

It really is important and I am prepared to pay to get these documents there.

I will be chasing the DHL situation as soon as I get out of bed.

4 hours ago, CharlieH said:

Spoke with DHL yesterday and they are operating.

 

 

CharlieH,

Thank you,

I will be on this tomorrow if I can find a depot in Kalasin area.

5 hours ago, VBF said:

Is it worth confirming by email that the recipient really does need paper copies?

That might be a general rule that may be relaxed at present. 

Does the organization have a portal to which you could upload scans of them?

Tried that already but because it is a Gold company they won't budge. They have all the scanned copies already. I have even been cleared by their security to prove who I am with a 10 minute phone interview.

Guys,

I went to my local post office and I needed to send original first copies of documents to the Channel Islands yesterday.

The postmaster left his office and checked what seemed to be a book on postcodes. He then said to me very politely that they could not send it at this time due to the Corona epidemic.

I am uncertain but I think international post goes to Khonkaen from Kalasin and then by air to Bangkok to be sent internationally.

Just checking to see if any of you know better than me. I believe all the flights are cancelled for right now.

Is there any DHL or something I can use to send these documents? Any help genuinely appreciated.

Snip

Well done keyboard  warrior

Ladies/gents,.

There was no problems exiting Thailand and entering Cambodia. I can only report my experience a few days ago/

Airports eerily quiet.

They took my temperature every time I went to my bank in Cambodia.

Siem reap in the center looks like a proper mess with construction going on  all over the place.

They were making everybody at Don Muang go into a separate line for health checks before allowing us to pass Immigration.

On 3/15/2020 at 5:01 PM, kenk24 said:

a bit demanding are you? 

 

if they don't give them out, and I would never expect that an airline would, where did they get the one they found for you? and from whom?

Wow,

Thanks for your contribution to the thread.

Did you sit up all night thinking of this fantastic response?

Qatar air always gave hygienic products on all journeys over 6/7 hours.

I like to clean my teeth after a meal so I can converse with other passengers without them being subjected to smelling of my meal.

But not high on your list of priorities?

On 3/15/2020 at 5:04 PM, kenk24 said:

I get a feeling that the ship sailed long ago on that one...

No worries, you have a nice day..

18 hours ago, drbeach said:

Sounds good but will they be hiring Thais or Burmese and Cambodians as they seem to do for every construction project these days? Bangkok is being built by foreigners from neighboring countries, rather than Thais.

Obvious who will be doing the work.

Thais, by and large, think this type of work is beneath them, (unless it is the hard working Isaarn women) but they don't come up with any alternatives that they would be happy doing work wise!

21 hours ago, JusticeGB said:

Never mind in April mindless fools will be throwing water away in droves. The mayor of Pattaya announced that he cannot stop people in Pattaya throwing water at songkran. It would be easy just fine the owners of bars with customers throwing water 20,000 baht and give the local police a 25% cut. 

Great suggestion!

Give the police more fantastic ideas to cheat and rip off the public.

Furthermore, do you think that a bar owner can stop drunken lunatics throwing water when it has been the norm forever and gradually got worse and far more dangerous?

The police are powerless to stop it, in fact they join in.

11 minutes ago, drbeach said:

Why would anyone choose to fly via the Middle East to get to Europe when you can fly direct? I haven't visited the Middle East since I was a toddler, and the only reason we even went through there (Dubai) was to transit to Africa.

From my point of view I could usually work it so I had 1.5-2.0 hours in the Middle East and on to Manchester. Usually direct flights from the UK are all from London.

When I have flown BA to London and then on to Manchester it has been a four hour wait in London plus the real pain of changing terminals. I will start looking towards Finnair and KLM.

OK they stop at their based country first and then on to Manchester, but their airports have got to be better user friendly and connection times than Heathrow.

1 hour ago, Billpro785 said:

Flown them several times this year both economy, and business. Have not noticed a change. I usually go to my trips and and choose the aisle before check-in at no charge. As a US licensed Aircraft mechanic, I find their aircraft in very good shape, have no problems flying them. 

The charges have just been introduced for seats with legroom in economy.

48 minutes ago, Andycoops said:

I have up on the rewards programs years ago for the very reason of reduced benefits and now just book the cheapest ticket.

+1.

And that will be me from now on, I am going to follow the advice of another poster and use my balance of points with another One world alliance member airline this year, and then follow you and book the cheapest respectable airline with good flying times, preferably direct to Europe.

16 minutes ago, SiSePuede419 said:

"So, you get off a Qatar flight, to connect to second Qatar flight and then you have security all over again ..."

 

Apparently you are not a sophisticated world traveler.

 

Other airlines require this too.

 

Korean airlines.  Japanese airlines.  Chinese airlines.

 

Probably all airlines.

 

If you worked in Security in another country airport would YOU trust Thailand to thoroughly screen luggage?  DUH.

 

Totally 100% normal.

 

BTW, I've flown Qatar.  The food is just as good as Japanese, Chinese and Korean airlines.  And all were better than United Airlines.

 

And yes, they gave me TWO free glasses of wine.  I don't fly in order to get wasted.

 

Drama Queen much? ????

 

Ah, as usual, a baiting post.

I see you have ignored a lot of points just to get your silly GIF in there and try to be smart and a tad rude.

I have flown many different airlines in all classes from economy to first over a number of years and on board many types of aircraft..

If it was the case of always double checking the customer at Qatar airport, how come it is a new rule when they never used to do it before?

Also, your point about not trusting Thailand to screen luggage is rather lame, if it was the point you mention and lack of trust in security screening in Bangkok, what about all the luggage transferred directly to your ongoing flight?

Food and drink has deteriorated and the way your post is phrased it looks like you haven't flown with them for quite some time.

Now go play with your computer and see if you can find any more hilarious GIFs to show us how clever you are.

I have checked website and my flight which is on March 30th. As of now, ( I am well aware things are constantly changing ) my flight leaves as normal via Doha, where I am only in transit.

4 minutes ago, oby said:

 

no problem, u cannot fly from thailand with qatar

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/gulf/2020/03/09/Qatar-bans-arrivals-from-14-countries-including-Iran-over-coronavirus-fears.html

Nothing about Thailand on Qatar website,  I am confused a bit?

1 hour ago, Kerryd said:

I used to fly Dubai-Bangkok-Dubai a lot when I was working in Afghanistan. For the last few years I was there I used Gulf Air (through Bahrain)

Started off using Air India (as they had flights from Kabul to Delhi and Delhi-Bangkok). They sucked wang though. One time I showed up for my return flight - on a confirmed ticket - and they told me to wait off to the side, then a couple hours later closed the check-ins and informed me that they'd put me on stand-by and the plane was full !! Had to reschedule that flight and then the connecting flight to Kabul. Plus you had to get a 3 Day Visa unless you had a connecting flight within a few hours of arriving and they wouldn't let you in the terminal at all until 3 hours before your flight !

After that I flew Ariana Afghan Airlines to Dubai (on ancient B-727s). Then used Thai Air (the company was booking the flights so I didn't care). Then I was able to take an Emirates Business Class flight and that was like a dream compared to the others.

I started booking my own flights after that and treated myself to another Business Class flight on Emirates. Got to Dubai, went to check-in and was told I had to use the Thai Air check-in in the main terminal, even though I was holding an Emirates ticket, because it was a code share "operated by Thai Air". Couldn't use the Emirates Business Class lounge either ! (Didn't get the Emirates Air Miles credit either.)

I then found Gulf Air, which, at the time, was offering Business Class seats for slightly more than Emirates/Thai were charging for Economy. As well, the Gulf Air flights left Dubai earlier, meaning I didn't have to spend the extra 8+ hours sitting in the terminal in Dubai as the Emirates/Thai flights often didn't leave until 10-11pm.
 
The Gulf flights departed Dubai much earlier and connected in Bahrain but the flight is barely an hour and they served a nice snack (and drinks). Their terminal was quite small and they had to use buses quite often as they had limited air bridges/gates but it was a short ride and they used the air bridges for the flights to/from Thailand.

Limited smoking rooms too (only 2 and one was part of a coffee shop so you had to be a customer to use it). The other one was a single small room and there'd often been 3 times more people outside the room than inside it. They were doing a lot of renovating every time I went through there. Wasn't an issue in the years after I quit though and the Gulf Business Class lounge was pretty good (their small lounge in Dubai was OK as well - they use the CP Business Class lounge in Suvarnabhumi).

I'd arrive in Bangkok at almost the same time as the Emirates/Thai flights, but on a much nicer flight and then could use the Priority Immigration lane as well.

One time Gulf had a special promotion as they'd just leased a new 777 Dreamliner. A 1st Class seat to Bangkok was only about $200 (US) more than a Business Class ticket.
It was awesome - especially as there were only 2 people in 1st class (but they were staffed for a full load).
However, when I went to check in for the return flight the staff started to apologize almost immediately as Gulf had taken that plane off that route and the replacement (A-330) didn't have 1st class seating.

So what did Gulf do ? They put me in Business Class and told me when I got to my destination to request a refund for the return ticket. I did that and they refunded the entire value of the return ticket ! So I flew back (Business Class) for free and got the return portion of my ticket refunded as well ! Awesome customer service.

I ended up with their "Black" Frequent Flyer card, the highest level they had. Never really used any of the benefits other than the luggage allowance.

But, like everyone else, towards the end (2013/2014) their prices started to climb, a lot. Got to the point where it really wasn't any cheaper to fly them than any of the other airlines in the region. It came down to mainly being a choice made on convenience or scheduling. One advantage they used to have was that their Frequent Flyer miles would never expire but eventually that changed as well.

Loved using the e-gate in Dubai though ! Never a line and it took 10 seconds to clear Immigration (scan the card, enter the lane, scan a finger, exit the lane). 
And we used to get a 90 Day stamp on arrival (down to 30 for Canadians the last time I checked).
(The card cost 200 Dirhams and was good for 2 years - well worth it for frequent travellers.)

The g/f used Qatar the last time she flew home (from Germany) as they were the cheapest option. Just saw that they were going to ban arrivals from Thailand though so she might have a problem going back to Germany though (unless the ban doesn't apply to Transit passengers).

What is most frustrating is that when oil went up to $150 a barrel, all the airlines raised their prices and added Fuel Surcharges. But when oil dropped back down to $50/barrel (or less) flights didn't get cheaper ! If anything, the prices went up even more !
(Kind of like governments, once they implement a new tax it's almost impossible to get them to give it up again or do anything other than raise it even more.)

Great and very interesting read, Thank you.

37 minutes ago, Orton Rd said:

Saw Finnair business class 1700 quid return to Heathrow, better than the middle eastern ones? never tried it

Me too from Manchester, I am keeping an eye out for both Finnair new economy premium and business class fares.

1 hour ago, baansgr said:

Can't beat BA on price or service, and if your from West London, T5 can be home in 20 minutes

I used them twice in Economy premium or as they call it World traveller plus. Seat OK, Service passable, delay London to Manchester was a pain. Given a choice in Premium Economy I would go with Cathay Pacific. Prices similar.