KhaoYai

I was told by a Thai lawyer who had also passed their bar exams that it is perfectly legal for a foreigner to hold a mortgage/charge over a plot of land but it depends on whether the local land office will accept such a mortgage. Clearly the only redress you could take in a default situation would be to force the sale of the property - you couldn't take possession. So, in the event of a forced sale, your lawyer would probably have to come up with a method of preventing the registered owner from disappearing with the money once a sale was made. Otherwise, on the face of it you could end up losing both your money and your security. There may be some way that payment from the buyer could be requested to be made to you - not sure but yes, you can hold a mortgage/legal charge.

I've had this problem before and can't remember what the replies were but that was on an identical laptop that was stolen before I ever found the problem. I run a failry old Acer Laptop running Windows 10. I only use it for e-mail, letter writing and browsing websites. Its normally left on all day with only my e-mail open. Every so often and whether its co-incidental or not I don't know but its always when I have Asean Now open, it will freeze, refuse to respond to the mouse or any other button other than holding down the power button to switch it off. Around 30 seconds after if freezes, the fan comes on at a fairly fast speed. I've felt underneath, it doesn't appear hot and there is no warning or on screen message, it just freezes. I've googled the problem and lots of people seem to have similar problems with a myriad of different answers but I'm yet to read anyone say 'thanks, I did that and its fixed'. I find it very strange that I'm always on Asean Now when it happens - I can't remember it happening at other times. Once I restart it its OK again, - the fan runs normally which to a novice like me suggests it wasn't really overheating in the first place. The problem rarely happens twice in the same day and I don't have to leave it any amount of time before switching it back on. It makes no difference if I've been using the laptop all day or its only been on for a few minutes. I'm not particularly techie and probably won't understand any in depth replies but does anyone have any idea what this problem might be? Better still, has anyone had it and fixed it. Because of my limited use I'm loathed to get rid and buy another laptop. I have Malware Bytes (free version) installed and both it and Windows Defender have never reported and problems. Edit: I was prompted to write this post as the problem had just occured again - whilst I was on this site. Another odd thing was that I'd just had a notification that someone had replied to a post I'd made. I'd clicked on that notification and was in the middle of writing a response when the freeze happened. Strangely, when I restarted and came back on here to write this, the notification that I was responding to was once again showing as unread?????

It most certainly is not. The words Assault or Rifle do not appear anywhere in the OP. The thread is about gun violence in the USA and the world's reaction to it in the light of the latest school shooting in the USA. The reason why the world is 'reacting with horror and incomprehension' is because most of the civilised world seem to get on pretty well without guns and we just can't work out why, with kids regularly being shot and killed, Americans just won't give up their guns. I couldn't care less if the killings are done with an old flintlock - they are all guns and all unecessary for the general public. If the USA has a crime problem then the answer is to deal with that problem through the officail authorities and if they fail, its them that need sorting out - you don't fix it allowing all and sundry to carry guns. Even responsible people make mistakes under duress - guns should not be in the public sphere. Contrary to the views of a great many Americans - the country is not a special case. You may not realise this but - going back to the BLM riots in recent times - when the rest of the world saw ordinary citizens standing outside public buildings in full cammo gear, carrying rifles, supposedly 'defending' those buildings - they didn't think, 'good for them' - they were horrified - absolutely horrified! But were they surprised? I doubt it - wer'e used to seeing Americans banging their chests, carrying out testosterone fueled behaviour and thinking its impressive - its not, not in the slightest.

5 guns and a crossbow and you don't consider yourself as a 'gun nut'. Crossbow, oh well that's alright then, they don't kill anyone do they? ????

Yes well, I think we know what the object of making false requirements is.

Yes, I'm sure I've read on here that some offices won't accept monthly income, full stop!

I was aware that a Non O could be obtained within Thailand but I thought it was only if you were applying for an extension - thanks for the clarification. I believe he is asking about long term as he mentions residency. Korat Immigration require the income to come from abroad - even if you are married unless you have a work permit. In fact, when they are on 'full awkwardness mode' they require the income to have come from abroad even if you have a work permit and run a business. Yes I know, they are wrong on that but my mate had a hell of a fight over that a couple of years back. As I'm sure you are aware, some offices make up their own rules and getting movement can be impossible. My mate called the helpline in Bangkok who agreed that Korat were wrong - would they call them and let them know? Not a cat in hell's chance. He went along with them that year and put 400k in the bank as his visa was almost up. His lawyer sorted it the following year.

Yes, that has already been said. I knew about both types of extension but I didn't know that you can use both and get 5 months.

But is that not because the purpose of applying for that Non O is that you are going to apply for an extension? As far as I'm aware, that's the only reason you can obtain a Single Entry Non O in Thailand. I wasn't aware that the 400k was required at that stage though.

James, I think you are confusing a Non O Visa with an extension of stay. The best route for you depends on how long you want to stay. If its short term, you can obtain a Single Entry Non O at the Thai Embassy/Consulate in your home country or a country where you have legal residence. That would give you a 90 day stay which if legally married, you can extend by 60 days giving you 5 months. There are differing amounts that you need to show for that visa - from 0 upwards but nowhere near 400K. Depending on where your Thai embassy/consulate is, you can also obtain a 12 month Multi Entry Non O Visa (MENO), again based upon legal marriage, which gives you unlimited stays in a 12 month period - each one is 90 days but again its extendable by 60 days. If you time it right and make your last entry just before the expiry date of the visa you can actually make it last up to 17 months. However, the number of embassies/consulates that offer a MENO is limited. Most of the places that did/do offer MENO's were neighbouring or close to Thailand to the best of my knowledge - I got my last one in Ho Chi Minh City. The requirements can different at each embassy/consulate. Some of those countries have only just opened up again following Covid restrictions and I don't think there have been any reports of MENO's being obtained in those countries yet. If your local embassy/consulate has gone over to the e-visa system, they will only allow a Single Entry Visa based on marriage. An extension of stay is where you enter the country, normally on a single entry route (I think this can be started from a 30 day exempt) and apply for a 12 month extension of stay based on either marriage or retirement. If successful you are granted the 12 month extension but you have to report to immigration every 90 days. There are differing requirements for each type but for marriage its 400K in the bank or an income of 40k baht per month coming from abroad unless you have a work permit. I think that's where you've got the 400k from.

You mean for an extension. You don't need 400k to apply for a Non O visa based on marriage.

2 extensions? I thought it was either or?

Mandatory for a shotgun licence in the UK - the only type of firearms licence available to the general public. Even then, applicants are vetted and interviewed by local police before a licence is issued.

A difficult one but again - a different attitude. The rest of the world tends to put its burglars in prison, not shoot them dead.

How about never able to purchase the gun - ever? You don't need them!

I could pick that entire post apart bit by bit. However, commenting on it as a whole - serves to illustrate what I see as a typical American point of view. You were most likley born in the USA, your parents, their parents etc. etc. so the 'American Way. is ingrained within your DNA. Just about everything you mention above is at odds with mainstream European thinking. Which way is the right way? Well in the UK and Europe we don't have dailly mass shootings. Just picking on one item to focus in on those differences - 'hunting'. Its not really hunting is it? Hunting is going out and finding wild animals to feed your family. What you regard as 'hunting', is grown men and women going out and taking pleasure out of the death of a wild animal. Be honest, you do it for fun, you do not do it for the good of the species at all. In the UK, whilst we have some way to go, a lot of 'hunting' has been banned. On the few occasions where its become necessary to cull a particular species, we employ specialist contractors to do the job. We don't have hordes of gun toting testoterone addicts driving around with dead wild animals strapped to their bonnets (hoods). Its about attitude and understanding and nothing will change in the USA unless and until those attitudes change. There will be more mass shootings, more school shootings and more deaths.

Please take this in the way its intended - you are clearly not in favour of mass gun ownership so we are basically on the same side.................however - society should not be divided. Of course there are differing views and that can be healthy but, there is usually a 'right and wrong'. The gun problem in the USA is clearly 'wrong' - 19 children and 2 adults would still be alive today of the USA chose the 'right' way in this matter. I can't speak for countries that I have no knowledge of but its quite clear that in countries such as the USA and the UK, never before has there been such division, often spilling over into hatred. This division is quite often cooked up by people with radical, crazy or supremacist views that use 'populist' subjects to obtain support. Take for example the Brexit debate in the UK - a matter that divided the country just as much as the USA is divided over gun laws. I'm not going to get into a Brexit debate - that is not the point but its factual that those who wanted the UK out of the EU used populist issues to gain support. The EU had its problems but they were mostly beyond the comprehension of UK society as whole - and that's fully understandable, we pay politicians to deal with those issues. So how do you get society on your side if you want to achieve Brexit? Tell lies, exagerate problems that people do understand (often minor issues). The promoters of Brexit began that campaign many years before the Brexit vote. The UK had just gone through almost 8 years of recession - what better time to blame the EU for all the country's woes and get people on your side? Just one example - tell people that EU membership is taking their jobs and keeping wages low through migration - they were experiencing the effects of that so it was quite easy to give them something to blame. It was a fact that hundreds of thousands of Eastern European people had come to the UK and were prepared to take what UK citizens would regard as low paid jobs - thereby enabling employers to keep wages low - take it or leave it. The migrant workers were also exacerbating the UK's housing crisis - again used as a way of promoting right wing nationalist views. What was never said was that it was actually employers that were taking advantage of the ability to utilise 'cheap labour' fron Eastern Europe. In much the same way, there are both people with vested interests in the gun manufacturing industry and right wing nationalist views, promoting gun ownership in the US and attempting to justify it. There is one man - some think of him as 'very clever' who identifies issues that concern potential 'right wing' supporters and then goes on to 'sympathise' with their views, whip them up into a frenzy over the chance they may lose their 'god given rights' as a way of gaining support for his own twisted ideology. He is not alone though. In general, and I accept that its a huge simplification, I believe that those who vehemently support gun ownership also have right wing nationalist views. And that, I believe is the root of the problem. So entrenched are these people in their right wing, nationalist views, that they just cannot see - no matter how many children die, that they simply don't need guns. They seem to see the USA as unique and fail to examine why other countries don't have the same problems. The problem also seems to exist within the USA's law enforcement agencies who appear to often seem to use 'shoot first' think later methodology. I cannot understand why, in a society that purports to be so 'god fearing', life is regarded so cheaply. Guns are endemic in US society and getting rid of them all would be a massive and impossible task but the removal of just one gun that saves just one life would be more than worth it. If Americans feel so unsafe that they feel they need to arm themselves, then perhaps they should be looking to the government and law enforcenment agaencies to solve that problem - not the gun shops.

Still irrelevant. That's war. Weapons are necessary in war - not in society.

We are not talking about wars - we are talking about normal life within a country. Guns do not make countries liveable. We don't have them in the UK or across Europe and with a couple on exceptions over 20 or 30 years, we don't have school shootings or any other form of mass shootings. Not by sane or insane people and why? Because for most people, guns are not readily available. I shoot (in Thailand), I shoot targets because I enjoy learing the skill. However, I don't and can't own a gun - they stay locked at the gun club which is where they should be.

??? Explain please.

Its interesting to see some members trying to defend gun ownership in the USA whilst others can clearly see the harm that a nation full of gun owners can do. Cries of 'its not guns that kill people, its people that kill people' seem to miss what should be an obvious point - people have to pull triggers! Without opening a political debate, I also find it interesting that those who support gun ownership also (in general) seem to support certain other political viewpoints - further illustrating the arguments that society (not only in the USA) is polarised and divided. However, and I believe most rational thinking people have the same views, how any sane person can continue to believe that gun ownership is a right or requirement for members of the general public is completely beyond me. What is so different about the USA that makes such a requirement necessary? Why is gun ownership not a right or requirement for other Western societies? Although many fail to reach international headlines, the facts are far worse than many realise - there's a mass shooting in the USA on a daily basis - up until 3 days ago the total for 2022 stood at 214!! https://www.insider.com/number-of-mass-shootingsin-america-this-year-2022-5 There's gun crime in all Western countries but the scale of it that exists in the USA is just unbelievable. Its not only mass shootings though - how many are killed daily as the result of an argument? Tempers are often frayed - remember as a youngster you'd get angry over stupid things and maybe throw the odd irresponsible punch on a Friday night? How easy is it to replace that punch with a bullet when you have a gun in your pocket? The latest argument coming out of the USA is that the mass shootings are the result of growing mental health problems - as if mental health is the cause. Why can the proponents of that viewpoint not see that if guns weren't so freely available in the USA, these shootings simply wouldn't happen? Why is it possible for the sane or insane to easily get their hands on an Assault Rifle!! The plain and simple facts are that 19 young children would still be alive today if an 18 year old had not been able to obtain guns. What is so bloody 'special' about the USA that make gun ownership a necessity? Nothing, that's the truth of it. There is and can be no justification. I don't even believe that gun ownership in the USA is simply because of the right to bear arms guaranteed in the country's constitution - there are plenty of US citizens that wouldn't dream of owning a gun. I believe that in general, as I hinted at earlier, those who own guns in the USA (and totally refuse to give them up) broadly represent a (large) section of society that hold similar views on many subjects. Just take a look at who was speaking at the recent NRA Conference in Texas if you want to understand where I'm coming from. Yes, societal and political polarisation is growing in many countries - strirred up by conspiracy theorists and possibly other nations trying to deliberately cause division and chaos - aided of course by the ability to promote such things across borders via the internet.. The difference is that gun ownership isn't either legal or rampant in most countries.

Pre-Covid I read somewhere that there were Bangkok Bank staff on hand at The Windmill Club in Pattaya that would facilitate account opening. Not sure it that's available but you could check it out.

I can confirm it will work - well most of the time. Just make sure that all your card settings are as you require - that can only be done at a Thai ATM. Sorry, I can't remember what those settings are - that will be clearer at the ATM. If there's an English speaker at your branch, ask for their help - I seem to remember having some probelm or other that was not clear using English language at the ATM but was quickly sorted by a staff member after switching to Thai. When I say 'most of the time - I've used my Kasikorn card a few times in the UK usually for online purchases but also at ATM's. It was refused once at an ATM without reason but worked both before and after that event. The main problems I've had are when I've tried using the card over the phone. For example, I tried using it to pay for a flight with Etihad over the phone and it was refused but accepted when switching to online booking. I had enabled the correct settings but both the bank and Etihad blamed each other for the problem. As a back up, I would set up a Dee Money or similar account before leaving Thailand. There is no way on this planet that Kasikorn will make changes/sort problems whilst your abroad. I had to go to my branch just to change my e-mail address. If things go wrong with your card and you have Dee Money and internet banking on your Kasikorn, you will at least be able to transfer some cash to your UK account (assuming you still have one).

Don't expect any consistency. My first approval last November took seconds. The second one in March with exactly the same details - insurance, vaccine certs with QR etc. (obviously new hotel booking), took 6 days. Just about to apply again - hopefully for the last time.

Crazy as it was, it was more than a suggestion if I remember correctly. A whole new 'Family Resort' was planned - idiots!