ukrules

I have a feeling that there being too many members might be a catalyst behind this recent change. Can they handle all the members? They need to strike a balance but I feel they've gone way too far and it won't be long before new discounted plans are introduced, perhaps just a year or two.

Nothing

Yes, I have a 5 year membership which is being upgraded right now, pending approval I'll be good until 2040.

It will be, especially once these price rises become active which isn't until October I believe. Right now you can still apply for the old pricing model until September 15th. After that I predict that what will happen to the new company will be a comedic failure and they will introduce a new selection of discount packages to make up for having achieved zero new sales between October and whenever they realise they messed it up completely - that might take a year or two but I'm reasonably sure it will happen. They did it before which is why things such as the 5 year membership for 500k and 20 year memebrship for 1 million baht exists. This whole thing started out with a 1 million Baht lifetime visa, then they doubled it to 2 million baht and failed miserably for years - the solution - introduce the 5 year option for 500k. I guess that did ok for a while. Then they bought the 20 year membership for 1 million Baht which may have been reasonably successful. After that they introduced upgrades from the 5 year membership to the 20 year membership for the same price (500k Baht) as the 5 year membership - I suspect this is when they started to get too busy over the last few years. Now they've hit the reset button and it all starts again. It's just a matter of time before they introduce new discount memberships with less 'perks and benefits' in order to bolster non existant sales.

If one day in a few months time, or even a few weeks time there's another publication in the Gazette then whatever it says will be obeyed

Well this new position is not going to be a boots on the ground job is it? He should be confined to the office and perhaps make the odd statement on TV

Yes.

Don't worry, he appears to have dug him up before he died

There is no mention of any loan sharking here, for all we know the noodle borrowed the money off some guy he knew with promises to pay it back. This kind of thing happens all the time. The reason I think this is that when it comes time to pay if they are 'loan sharks' then generally don't send the old man who personally lent the cash to collect it, they send a couple of thugs....I've seen it. I believe the Thais call them the 'helmet people' as they drive around on motorcycles wearing helmets (up to no good and hiding their id) looking for the people who owe them.

What is it with this Anutin guy and cannabis? Why does he care?

Sounds very similar to my experience although it seemed to clear up a bit quicker for me, there was a lingering throat clearing thing that lasted around a week - a slight annoyance. Now what really bugs me is that they took the pseudoephedrine based decongestants off the market due to commercial scale drug manufacturers using it in massive quantities to make meth or something like that. None of the alternatives work for me at all at any dose. So due to the actions of these gangsters I can no longer buy the most effective thing that dries up your nose 100% while you're taking them and I had to ration the few capsules I had left (Benadryl Plus from the UK - not the same as the US product I believe) for night time use so I could sleep properly - sleeping with a runny / blocked nose never works for me. That was my biggest concern during the week I had it - clearing my blocked nose so I could sleep well. I had a heavy cold that lasted a few days more than a normal pre 2020 cold.

I got my upgrade application in already and it's going through the approval process to convert a 5 year membership into a 20 year membership for 500k Baht. So for me that's it - I'll take the additional 15 years assuming it's approved and after that I'm done with them - I'll be in my mid 60's by then anyway. I have a feeling these packages won't last too long anyway and there will be big changes again inside the next year or two.

Yes, they had some measure of success during the COVID crisis and they then got incredibly greedy. It will be their undoing.

I know plenty of people who've had a bit of a 'heavy cold' for 3 to 5 days recently (last few months) with about an additional week to full recovery. Nobody that I know who's had it seems to be reporting it to anybody, cold medicines help and it goes away quickly. I had it myself recently after a night out, as did the Mrs. My point here is that if nobody's reporting it to anybody then they won't know about it. For it to show up in waste water in Bangkok means there's a significant number of people being infected, they're just not going for any kind of treatment - probably because it doesn't require anything you can't find at the pharmacy - or anything at all. When I had it all I took was a decongestant, I didn't even take anything for the fever as is was barely noticeable, I fixed that by altering the AC temperature.

These changes will drive the company into loss making very quickly. They will then be forced to backtrack, give it a year or two, if that long.

This guy just somehow manoeuvred himself around the popular vote into the Prime Minister position - he's not going to care one bit what his underlings over at immigration think and he's not going to consider what visa agents think for a second.

I live in Hua Hin, where the retirees from the cold parts of the world flock to every winter. They don't retire to Thailand, they come for an extended period of time - it's not a vacation really - they live here during the cold winters, then return home. They come in their thousands without fail every year, most get visas and do nonsense trips to surrounding countries to extend their stays, many of them own a holiday homes here, likely on some 30 year lease type deal - but they do not live in Thailand full time. It's not a tiny percentage around these parts, the demographic may be very different where you live - but it's not the same everywhere. I have neighbours on both sides of the house where I live who do this, they're in Europe right now and won't come back until October or November and they will stay for whatever they get out of the visas, they don't like unnecessary travel to other countries and I know a few who used to do that but now just stay for a month or two less each year.

The thing is - there's no 30 day stamps issued on entry while on a tourist visa - you get 60 days if you have an embassy issued visa - this leads me to believe they're not talking about tourist visas - they're talking about 90 day visa exempt stamps on arrival. A very big change indeed.

About time they did this, 30 days is nowhere near enough, that with just a single extension limits peoples trips to 60 days unless they want to battle a bureaucratic nightmare to get visas in advance - which many people simply don't want to do - and even then it's not enough. So a massive amount of people limit their trips to 60 days for no reason other than that's what they can get with the route of least resistance, I know this because I know and have met many people over the last decade, they come here, get visa exemption for 30 days, extend it once then go home. They would stay longer but will never fly to another country and come back just for the sake of a new entry stamp. I've been saying this for years. A simple change like this will make a huge difference to tourism, especially winter tourism.

There are never roaming charges for receiving SMS messages.

It says payment must be made in 7 days on my form which is an upgrade form.

Misunderstanding my arse

Was that an upgrade from a 5 year membership or a new application where they did not know you from before?

Exactly, they might as well be hiring the retarded to work there.

It's quite obvious that even though they advertise a phone number, it almost certainly sits in an empty room with nobody to answer it. The level of 'service' is ZERO Stop wasting your time phoning them