Meerkat

It might be because of the large gap between on- and off-shore rates at the moment. So the rate you got was better than you could get offshore, but worse than the rate you could get onshore. If that makes any sense!

If you are paying in any other country where there's only one rate, you'll be better-off paying in the local currency.

HomePro (but in Rangsit) was where I had my biggest hassle in getting billed in THB. The first chit came with the amount converted to HKD at an appalling rate (I remember it being about USD 150 worse than where spot was - it was a large purchase). Took an hour or so, including calling both their bank and mine, to get it sorted. The staff themselves were trying to be helpful throughout - they simply hadn't been taught how to use the CC machine properly.

I have also experienced this many times - I always insist on the transaction being made in Baht. In almost all cases eventually the staff in the shop/restaurant have managed to do this for me although it is a real pain sometimes.

It is yet another example of trying to rip off tourists in Thailand - i sometimes wonder why they are continuing to holiday here.

Wonder how many othe countries you have used your credit card in?

TH

Agreed. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Thailand - the practise is worldwide with Visa and M/C. AFAIK Amex hasn't started doing it (yet).

You just have to get in to the habit of saying "Bill me in THB please" or whatever currency when you hand your card over. And stick to your guns if they do convert.

They're not "insurgents". They're Muslims.

Virgil, Out!

Aside from religious bigotry being against forum rules, your comment shows not only a lack of knowledge of the particular situation at hand, but also does a huge disservice to the other one billion+ Muslims who aren't behaving the way you seem to think they do.

No - the point is that this is a LAW, enforced by the GOVERNMENT, that makes it it astonishing, barbaric and defacto slavery. Anyone who defends this law ought to be ashamed. It is also, without doubt, the most telling indictment of Thailand I am aware of to date..

Using HK as an example, the problem is that whilst maids (the bulk of HK's imported labour) have some rights enshrined in law, they are routinely flouted and the system itself makes it nigh on impossible for them to gain any legal retribution.

Come to think of it, a law introduced a few years ago whilst I was still living there effectively taxed all foreign maids - and only foreign maids - at a higher rate than any other section of the population who earned the same amount. The government pooh-poohed any suggestion of racism...

Bear in mind too that almost anyone is allowed right-of-abode and by extension permanent residency in HK after living there legally for 7 years. Except for foreign maids that is...

I'm not condoning the abysmal treatment here in Thailand, but they certainly aren't alone.

"Eh? I thought they got power by the barrel of a gun, in direct opposition to popular acclaim. "

Those barrels were merely convenient flag poles for the yellow garlands tied round them.

The yellow garlands were the message, not the gun barrels, in what was purely/merely a piece of political theatre.

My guess is that they made sure there would be no cock-up by not issuing any ammo.

Look back at the newspapers, and even the archives of forums such as this. The coup was greeted with universal acclaim.

Even the "Thais are all idiots" brigade of farangs were cheering for once.

There was not even a murmur of opposition, nor any indication that anybody would have wished to express any opposition. It was the strongest expression of popular acclaim that I can imagine.

Ah, apologies. I didn't realise you were being sarcastic in your earlier post.

So they are now trying to undermine the CNS, who got power by popular acclaim.

Eh? I thought they got power by the barrel of a gun, in direct opposition to popular acclaim.

Still happy with it here too - especially out of the city.

We've used it to drive from BKK to Phuket, Kanchanaburi and Koh Chang with no problems. Routing to a hotel in Koh Chang automatically sends you to the ferry port on the mainland first - nice touch!

Using it extensively around Khao Yai, I was also impressed with how many small roads/dirt tracks were included. Well, I might not have been so impressed if I hadn't been in the 4x4...

It did try to send us into the River Kwai at one point however, but that was the only major routing error I can think of.

Does anyone know if there's a map update? I'm still using the original maps that came with it when I bought it (last summer IIRC).

I seem to remember the visa benefit being a 90 day entry that could be extended incountry for 90 days at a local immigration office.. I am sure thats how it was presented.. 90 day incountry extensions for 1900 baht each time indefinately (for 5 years with another 5 years to be given automatically for the lifetime etc)..

Correct. And to add that if you get a new passport, you get a new 5 year visa from scratch, rather than them just transferring the existing visa end-date from the old one.

Anyway, since the original email I got back from them immediately after the BKK Post article, I've heard nothing else (nor have I chased them up). I do note that they've stopped advertising here though...

Is this developing into a classic "Sovereign Nation stands up to Multinational Corporations" skirmish?

Thailand is only a small country (no bigger than France, and with only as many people as the UK), but there is the precedent of David having stood up to Goliath.

Three cheers for the Thai Government for having the guts that the French and UK (and other) Governments don't have.

Good luck to this older generation of Thais, taking on younger generations of the arrogant West.

If everyone took that attitude, there would be no new drugs produced to copy.

Of course another irony with this is that had the scheme been allowed to continue in something approximating its existing format (and with some form of explicit government approval rather than the uncertainty we've had since September), the cancellation of the THB 3m investment visa for new applicants would probably have led to improved sales for TE. Not to Thaksin's ridiculous 1m member level (which I still think was nothing more than hubris), but certainly towards the much more realistic 7,000 member target which was the most recent number I'd read about.

Well as an existing member, the short answer as to what is going to happen is, “We don't know”.

And it would appear that neither do the people who work there either. On reading the news this morning I emailed them to ask what happens to existing members (and to them) and got this in response:

Dear Mr. Meerkat,

Thank you for your feedback on this news. Please be informed that Thailand Elite has only one price policy at the moment.

However, we are trying the debate the recent negative news towards us and would like to ensure youself and other members that we are still running our operation as usual.

Thank you for your kind concern about us and look forward to hearing from you again very soon.

Best regards,

As I told some friends recently, the fact that the programme was approved in two previous reviews since the coup, and yet sent back for a third review led me to consider that the government simply hadn't got the answer they wanted from the first two! Of course if they devalue the programme rather than cancel it, it should get them around the potential for lawsuits (although not being a lawyer, I have no idea at what point a degradation of services is considered a de facto cancellation). Let's face it though; the odds of a couple of thousand foreigners winning a court case against a Thai military government in a Thai court are up there with Belgium winning the rapidly approaching cricket World Cup!

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if I get to keep the 5 year visa...

Most importantly however (and in spite of the various warnings about the risk of investing in a developing economy that I and others have given with respect to the project in the past), I do hope that nobody bought the card for whom the loss will have a material effect on their lifestyle.

also Deputy Transport Minister Sansern Wongcha-um was quoted,

"The relocation of operations to Don Muang by airlines will be on a voluntary basis with no compulsion. The fact is that some airlines have to transfer to ease congestion [at Suvarnabhumi] and for the repairs at the new airport. Airlineswere making their own calculations on whether relocating would benefit or hamper their operations."

I don't understand this. In the first sentence he states that the move will be voluntary, but in the second one he says that some airlines will have to move so that repairs can be effected.

So which is it?

Air traffic controllers can be hired from abroad if necessary.

No need - DM has still been operating continuously since Suva opened, and therefore still has an operating ATC service.

A lot of people seem to think the old airport was moth-balled when the new one opened, which isn't the case. Obviously traffic is vastly down, but I'd estimate there are still upwards of one approach every 20-30 minutes. Likewise, it's still got all the correct international designations (DMK/VTBD).

I don't know how many flights are proposed to be moved back - maybe 50-100 a day? Don't reckon it will be a problem shifting any necessary extra personnel to meet them.

Bit off topic guys but does anybody know the old flight path route for the flights that land at Don Muang?

I think they came in from the East but I may be wrong.

I have just bought a house on klong 4 Rangsit and am worried about the noise from the flights overhead.

Cheers,

JJP

Depends how far down Khlong 4 you are. If you're near Rangsit-Nakhon Nayok Rd you should be fine. We're just off the main road next to the beginning of Khlong 3 and the planes all but go right over the house. Even when DM was open full-time it was rarely a problem.

In a democracy Thaksin won't be allowed to run in the first place. The military (so far) only enforces the rules the justice system ignored for too long.

Why wouldn't he have been allowed to have been elected? Had he been convicted of anything before he was put into power by the people? Or is there another condition that wouldn't allow him in? That's not a dig - I don't know what conditions there are to becoming PM.

The facts of the matter are this: Thaksin has not been convicted (or even charged) with anything yet. If there is a case to answer I want to see him in court, but so far the only people in this sorry affair who have clearly broken the laws of the land are the coup-leaders. Of course they then rewrote the constitution to absolve themselves of such crimes.

Whilst I agree with the notion that the constitution needs tightening up to provide a better system of checks and balances to limit the power of the PM, democracy in this country cannot flourish with the military's sword of Damocles hanging over its head. If, for instance, the coup-leaders offered themselves up for the charge of treason (if that's the right part of law in cases such as these) to a newly elected government, then perhaps I'd hold out more hope.

Chownah, the coutnry can't move forward if Thaksin's face is on TV and his interviews are in the papers. It will be return to square one - back to anti-Thaksin demonstrations vs. pro-Thaksin rallies, back to Thaksin controlled courts administering "justice" no one trusts. Add a confrontation with the generals who won't let him back in politics at any cost, and you have a country on the breach of civil war.

Either that, or get the square face off the news.

I'm not sure I can see the country move forward at all; at least not as a democracy.

What's going to be the purpose of holding elections every few years under the new constitution if the elected government is only there but for the grace of the military?

They call this country the Land of Smile or whatever.. not the land of the Free

IIRC, Thailand actually means, "Land of Freedom".

There is some precedent, as the original article stated.

Sonthi used to beam ASTV into Thailand from the NSS6 satellite (Indian I think). I used to watch the English language news on this bird and it was as slanted away from the TRT as the domestic press was alleged to have been slanted towards it. Certainly made for an interesting foil, anyway. The signal would occasionally break up as the news was recorded in Thailand and then sent by internet to India for streaming up to the sat to be beamed back here!

It's funny really. I've been a Windows user back from the days of 3.1, and was comfortable in the likes of DOS and CP/M before then. I'd always steered clear of Macs until last year with the advent of the Intel models with the promise of running Windows. I was on the lookout for a new PC so thought I'd give an iMac a try, knowing that I could always run XP on it if I didn't like the interface. I have to say I was blown away with what I could do. I've now got 2 iMacs - neither of which I've even bothered to install Bootcamp on - but I've still got a couple of XP machines too. Er...and three Linux boxes and an Atari ST that (with a bow to the earlier poster) I've used for ages for music production.

For everyday things like email, calendar and web browsing, the OS X apps beat the out-of-the-box Windows ones hands down. Photo manipulation is another app that Macs do extremely well - the installed iPhoto is good, but Apple's Aperture is better - and better than similar programmes I've used on XP. XP, of course, wins hands-down for the sheer volume of available apps, but nowadays I always check to see if I can find an OS X version before getting the XP one.

Many people (and I was one) seem to think that OS X is a "black box" OS - nice and friendly, but you can't tweak anything as easily as within XP. That simply isn't true - if you like tinkering, you can do so to your heart's content on the Mac. True, you'll be messing around with the delights of Unix (and probably at command-line level, although there is much you can play around with via the GUI), but that OS has been around for ages and so the development community is immense. The myth that OS X is only for beginners and that a real user will always go for XP is just that: a myth.

The issue of cost has arisen here, and whilst I haven't bought a new XP machine for a while, reviews I've read recently in the computing press seem to show that Macs now offer good vfm compared to similarly configured pre-built XP machines. Of course you can always build your own XP machine much cheaper, but that's not an option for everybody.

My favourite piece of hardware at the moment is still my trusty Dell X-1 running XP, just for its amazing portability and flexibility. When I'm rooted to the desk though, I'm happiest using OS X. Remember too that Leopard gets released this year - if it lives up to the previews, it's going to be one cracking OS.

I used to bank with HSBC HK before switching to StanChart. HSBC has an account called Combinations - it's not a bad account to have if you need to muck about with different currencies offshore. Bear in mind though that you'll usually not get great interest rates on your THB deposits. Having said that, you'll get comparatively tight bid/offer spreads on FX conversions.

Looks like it's been renamed; here's the link:

http://www.hsbc.com.hk/1/2/hk/banking/accounts#fcy_acc

I must admit: after the announcement just after Christmas that the scheme was to be allowed to continue, I thought that'd be the end of the question - at least until a new government was elected.

I seem to have been out-flipped - or flopped! This new new review is news to me.

Perhaps that should be the new TAT slogan - Visit Thailand and leave your flip-flops at home; we've got plenty enough over here.

I'll give the girls a shout tomorrow and will post what I get back. Again...

I am a FX dealer based in the UK. On tuesday the baht was 70.55 to the £, fell a little wednesday to 69.75 , then thursday i saw it drop dramatically to 67.25 and Friday morning UK time it went to 64.9 before closing friday at 65.72. I phoned my Thai friend who by co-incidence arrived in BKK Thursday afternoon after the big drop had started and warned him (this was on Friday) that the baht had gone up in value by an amazing amount and he was due a big dissapointment whe he changed his pounds. I said he will only get around 64.50 instead of the hoped for 69 when he left thge UK . But i just changed them all at 69.33 he said!!

So i don't understand why if the spot rate is 65.72 , you can still get 69.33 in BKK. I have never known this to happen nbefore , although they are sometimes a few hours behind the curve they are not usually THAT behind

Are you an interbank FX trader?

If yes, I'd recommend you stick to currencies that don't have separate on- and off-shore markets. I'd also recommend not repeating what you've written here to the rest of your desk.

BHT Weakening rapidly again, fk it, just peg it - thats what they really want to do anyways.

You might actually be on to something here, if only for the BOT to try and save face over this sorry issue.

WoW Europe for me (Alonsus Realm). Just got into it in the last few weeks since an injury has stopped me golfing for now.

Lag is usually between 300 and 600 ms, so no great problem.