SbuxPlease

My first year in Thailand: 8 Second Year: 5 Third Year: 2 Fourth Year: 6 Fifth Year until now: 7 The initial fascination with the place wore off fast once it stopped being new. I started a business which hastened my discontent and went through a stage where I felt like I couldn't shake the stress. Every time some new senseless red tape popped up (which as we know can be pretty often), it was like one more nail in the coffin of my personal hellish insanity. Since that difficult period I decided to either a) leave or b) figure out how to accept what it is - without trying to change all of Thailand to match my ideas of what's best. ???? I've leaned hard into option B and found that after I started getting to the beach more often, better delegating tasks to people who are equipped to deal with bull-splat, and just stop worrying about everything. I also really leaned into building a good social circle of others who are also happy. Now I've found the enjoyment again. Home country, USA: 6.5-7.5. I do miss my friends and family, and honestly sh*t just works pretty well in my city and it's gorgeous in the summer time. But I don't miss how hard I hard to work just to keep pace with the next unhappy guy when I lived there.

After business success in my home country, I decided to invest in Thailand 6-7 years ago and have started and operated several businesses since in Bangkok. One was a startup that needed top talent, another is a retail shop in a specialized industry, and another (was) an attempt at a BOI company software startup. As an American I'm eligible under the Treaty of Amity to own businesses 100%, however the process for registering for the treaty takes from half a year to more than a year with a lawyer involved, and potentially 100k+ THB if you use an internationally reputable firm. During the lengthy process various DBD officers may request the same set of documents multiple times, which leads you to forward the last email you already forwarded to them with the scanned attachments - again. Once the business is properly registered, normal business operations such as opening bank accounts or getting a credit card terminal still feels like an egregious document and red-tape saturated experience if a foreigner is the sole owner. There is no access to small business operating capital unless the business has a long standing relationship with the bank and plenty of assets. Local traditions such as putting a physical tax stamp on documents that must be signed immaculately on every page will take hours out of the CEOs day - every day. Time that would be much better utilized developing the business model. These experiences are smoother if you have a Thai partner who can handle all these in their own name and/or know which shortcuts are available, so some people (like me!) recommend opening and setting up the company entirely under a trusted Thai person and then transferring it all later. Filing monthly payroll forms, annual and half year tax reporting requirements, withholding tax and VAT reports is either a full time internal job or needs to be outsourced to an accounting firm. Outsourcing may be cheaper and more reliable but you'll still need an internal person to handhold the accounting firm through documenting every transaction. For these regulations alone expect to spend a minimum of $10k USD annually just to keep your company registered and ready for business whether you have a single sale during the year or not. After some time you begin to wonder if your luck (and time) might be better spent with the tax enforcement officers instead of the front office. If you're unlucky and get some employees that can't meet the demands of your growing business (a serious risk), you might find them to be difficult or extraordinarily expensive to replace. As a founder or CEO that's another drain on your capital reserves. I started the BOI company as my second business, and after approved for it I came to realize that while the incentives are nice, the reporting requirements to maintain the company are much higher than for a traditional company. If the startup has not yet found its market, that could mean the only thing gained is more wasted CEO time and baggage holding the company back. In summary, Thailand has a long way to go before any smart money founders are going to label Bangkok as a "start up hub" of any kind. A large international firm that needs a local HQ will hire Deloitte to cut through the tape and get them running and doesn't mind the USD 5-6 figure annual holding costs. If the local staff will be dozens of people or more, it will be easier to spread the various expenses across the team. However, top talent may not necessarily choose Bangkok as the best city in the world to live in because of ... well... I think we all know the difficult parts.

My condo was built in the 80s. Either they were aware of their own engineering limitations and tripled up on concrete and beam sizes, or we'll be the first to go.

>Pattaya police reminded gogo and nightclub owners to immediately call police if a customer refuses to pay a bill to avoid a further confrontation and to never, ever, under any circumstances, physically attack a customer.< Phew, good thing.

This article, posted here, is like throwing a filet mignon into the lion's den.

A lot of landlords don't even know (or care) to do TM30. It's very likely they'll take your signature and your money and that's it.

I live in lower Sukhumvit and totally gave up on all public taxis. They park and clog the throat of this Soi waiting for tourists who don't know better to pay outrageous fixed prices. Anyone else who tries to park there is verbally attacked by these taxi gangsters and they use orange cones to try and reserve their spots. At night they sit there drinking beer with the policeman who hangs out on the soi as well. I hope they sleep it off before taking the next fare but I doubt it.

This is a sophisticated crime if true, most people wouldn't know how to pull it off. So many white collar crimes go unpunished, I'm impressed the FBI bothered to track this guy down in Thailand.

At 2am on lower Sukhumvit the drinks just flow on the streets and keep going at the little bars that get set up for the world to see. Who's to say what timezone their body is accustomed to. Your 4am may be their 4pm. God knows there are precious few other activities in this city. Not to mention the local groups who station at the 7-11 steps getting wasted on Sangsom until the wee hours. A rule change to allow the bars to stay open would at least keep them inside and out of view. Not sure a 2am rule has or will ever solve any known problem except to breed corruption. Just like the 1pm to 5pm hours when you aren't allowed to buy alcohol during the day.

I was into BTC quite early, 2011. I loved it for the ease of sending money outside the obnoxious banking network. I still love it for sending money to international suppliers and colleagues who universally hate Paypal and all the controls around bank wires. The volatility made me a lot of money over the years. Had I never sold my first purchase, I'd buy an island somewhere and then a second island so I could take vacations from my first island. But alas I sold along the way thinking I'd already hit the jackpot. Oh well. I still love BTC as an irreversible transfer method. But I no longer see it as any kind of investment that's worth the time. If you buy and hold, you're gambling. The future of BTC is as a payment mechanism. Regrettably, bank cards, credit cards, QR codes bank transfers, and cash are pretty freaking good and BTC doesn't really beat them yet for the vast majority of daily transactions, and it's still way too complicated for the average person. So BTC will remain niche indefinitely.

What I read into this is that there's at least 1 guy in immigration who thinks all this hoopla could be done online and save everybody a lot of time. I hope he's successful and the old guard doesn't block the path.

Recently thinking about it every day????

With the tourists back, my Soi along Sukhumvit has gone from idyllic to absolutely bonkers. I'm worried somebody is going to die because a racing car or motorcycle can't be bothered to slow in the congested area. I'm worried that a 9 year old kid will get clipped by a side mirror or an unsuspecting tourist will get creamed by Grab bike with no muffler. The biggest problem is these so called taxis that just park and wait for a customer who will pay their unmetered rate. You know the kind that have a vinyl banner hanging on the car for a floating market, wat pho, etc? They are blocking the lane for hundreds of meters, causing pedestrians and any vehicle to fight each other for the remaining part of a lane to get around. What are our chances of convincing the nearest boys in brown to come and get rid of the grifter taxis and slow down the vehicles that are going to hurt people? I've lived here long enough that I could get together perhaps a dozen business owners and residents who'd agree.

We use didww for Thailand sip trunking. Previously used CAT. Ours is for business, but you can easily buy one number. Then you can terminate into any VoIP system you like and even pay with an international credit card

This topic comes up here periodically and the general consensus is the Thai laws do not help the foreign parent much, but in cases where the Thai parent/mother is harmful to the child (drugs, alcohol, abuse, etc.), there is a pathway available. Expect to spend a million baht or more with a top notch law firm and a year or two to gain custody. There was a thread a while back on Thaivisa about an American using Tilleke & Gibbons law firm whom I believe has a divorce/custody niche. A more favorable pathway is, as another poster mention, play the long game. If it's not working out, just accept this and think about the ways you can incentivize the mother to want to stay in Bangkok. Can you rent her a condo nearby? Can you give a weekly budget that she has to pick up from you in cash? All this may be a whole lot cheaper than the alternatives if you can swallow your ego. You know her best, and might have some idea about what to do. It's tempting to go nuclear at this stage, but those stories are always so ugly.

A bit of proper marking on the road would go a long way in lower Sukhumvit where I see the bikes on the sidewalks constantly. A lot of traffic jams are started and propagated by just one or two vehicles doing something stupid. Like cars stopping in the left lane, which makes hundreds of cars behind change lanes to get through. Or cars getting jammed up at the U turn areas. If there was a protected turn-only lane, then when somebody misses his turn he can't block another lane trying to get into queue. Yeah. None of this will ever happen I think.

The cost to buy is just the start. Then you need to maintain. Which, sorry Thailand, you cannot afford.

My Thai colleagues get it too - they see the waste and inefficiency, but also think it's "normal" and "no one could ever change it", and "not my problem". When you can get a day off work just to visit the DLT, it's suddenly not so bad (if you hate your job and work for "the man"). So, like us farangs, they complain a bit but accept it as an unchangeable system. The only thing that could really change this is enough of the population traveling around the world and seeing various other ways of doing things and deciding that it matters. But, you have to understand that the ones who can travel like and "get it" will move to live in another country anyways.

The dual pricing irks me because it feels like a type of racist discrimination - something many people have a moral objection to in my home country because of some various beliefs and rights that the country (tries) to stand on. If we put up a gatekeeper outside Times Square who charged $150 after judging a visitor's citizenship/ethnicity and deciding they are the wrong one - even if you've lived in the US for 10 years - (everyone else no charge) they might feel a bit hacked off too. In any case, the other benefits still outweigh this particular thing so I'm still here.