StayinThailand2much

It's simple, they just assumed that each tourist (all singles, obviously) spent 1,000 baht on accommodation per night, and 800 baht per day on food and beverages...

15+ hours return (for the driver); good luck finding a taxi at Suvarnabhumi for such a trip. Of course, if you offer enough cash, you might get lucky... Probably you'd have to offer at least eight or ten thousand baht.

I just learnt that 'Bora Bora' is a country. Wonder, whether, adding Tahiti and other islands, French Polynesia could have come close to Thailand's ranking...

Was this sponsored by the TAT like other recent 'news' reports about Thailand as a destination?

LOL. 'Interests' and searches mean nothing if they don't result in actual bookings... I often check out accommodations on Agoda, or tours on other websites, but only go through with the booking once in a while.

I'm sure he brought them in when travelling here by plane... 😝

And the TAT and government want 80 million foreign tourists, or roughly three times the number they got over the past year! Nuff said... Perhaps they should invest into infrastructure (besides the airports) for once.

Yes, me too. Was pulled aside and questioned for up to half an hour at three immigration checkpoints in early 2020. Left Thailand later for about six months. After that no issues, and I got a long-term visa following that.

It's not about those people in the North East, but the few greedy upper-class billionaires who want to add 300 baht times X to their already outrageous fortune...

Didn't the TAT announce in the past that Pattaya tourists come for the temples?

That's exactly what they want. No pesky tourists, or 'having to play the host'... No, all they want is grabbing as much money with a minimum of effort from their 'guests'. And more and more tourists learn it the hard way, visiting only once...

Perhaps they mean the large numbers of Chinese tourists buying up all the cheap snacks and instant noodles at Big C... 😄

I remember well, how Anutin called (Western) foreigners "dirty", and asked Thais to stay well away from them not so long ago... Add how dirty and polluted the country is, overpriced compared to neighbouring countries, and the changed attitude of Thai women. - Yes, I really want to be fleeced more for all this... Not! - This is not the 1980s where there were limited other destination choices in the region.

If one has been here long or often enough, one will know that Thai greed knows no limits. If successful, those 300-baht fees would quickly be doubled and tripled...

Seems, they are believing their own propaganda and fantasy numbers... "We want 80 million tourists", and each one should pay 300 (or why not 3,000?) baht.

That's right. No way even 2% (6 baht) of such a 300-baht fee would be used for "improvements"...

Beautiful mountains in Bhutan, and mountains of turds swimming in the Pattaya sea... Yes, why not charge extra for either.

If you do this for a while, i.e. staying like this for 6 months every year, you might encounter IOs at the border who may question you 'why you come here so often', and 'what you are doing in Thailand', and, you could, possibly, be denied entry at some point.

Only the Brits, I'm sure...

That's exactly why I cancelled a few holidays away from home. Not wanting to get into trouble with "late" and different TM.30 reports... Well done, Thailand!

So the survey found out that, thanks to students reading their assigned textbooks, reading "on average" isn't doing so badly... That's like saying each New Zealander has 5 sheep and 2 cows grazing at home in the front-yard, or that each and every Thai has bank deposits of 255,000 baht (all deposits divided by 70 million)...

Hopefully not paid for by selling fake gold...

Randomly spending large sums of money in a short time for low-quality goods and services...

Yes, OPEC could learn from them how drilling can be faster, unattached from the environment, and more profitable...

Invest in infrastructure and transportation (not just in Bangkok), get rid of overcharging, scams, and taxi mafias. Train personnel in foreign languages and customer service, etc, etc. - Why should one travel to 'second-tier cities' if quality of basically everything away from Bangkok and the few costal spots is 'poor' and inadequate for foreign tourists? Not to mention 30- and 90-day reports one has to worry about when travelling to other places...