CWMcMurray

Gosh darn it you guys, would you pause for a moment before suggesting seriously that a guy who's never (apparently) taught before, and has worked in trades such as drumming and construction, to teach English in Thailand? Most of us who have done it, bitched and moaned like cats being run over by a motorbike! Could you please refer to my prior post about how unsuitable most folks are, how difficult the work is, how lousy it pays, how the OP is not qualified, and how unlikely he'll be legal in Chiang Mai of all places? Gee whiz, the only employment I ever got (when I was overqualified) in Chiang Mai proper, was at 7,200 baht per month!!

What is this guy who only has about $10K now, supposed to do after 12 or 15 months, when his original B visa runs out? Spend $3,000 more running home to get another 12 month visa on which he won't get a work permit, either?

robeetle, if you're sitting at age 54 in the USA with no more than 12 or 13 thousand dollars, and don't possess the skills to teach English well, your chances of surviving here (in Chiang Mai, the only place you mentioned) are virtually nil. But if you're in love, true love as in Princess Bride, nothing else matters. Can you eat somtam for 3 meals per day?

I wasn't trying to say he should, would be qualified to or enjoy teaching. I just am saying that is about te only job he can realistically even attempt. He is not going to be hired by any MNC or Thai company, he doesn't have enough money to open any sort of business of his own and all of the work he has previously done he can't do here. I am just saying his options are slim... Just because he has never taught doesn't mean he can't ,it just means the percentage is low. If he does come he should just hope that he can teach, he loves it, and he can find a job with his qualifications in CM because he is absolutely going to need to find work. He will also face dificulty on the visa front at a time when it is getting more difficult to stay if you are not legal.I hope this better qualifies my above statement; I am in no way calling for unqualified teachers to come to Thailand or that it is an easy job that anyone can or should do.

I don't know for sure but I can tell you, anecdotally at least, that the term is used much more loosely in the US. Here in Thailand I think you need to be higher up before you are considered a manager in general, but as far as the definition for this study - who knows...

And I believe that is exactly your point

No it doesn't mean that you can't dream of getting out of the US. It just means that it may be difficult for you if you come. You job prospects are probably less appealing here than they are in the US and if you end up coming here you could find most of your savings disapearing fairly quickly.

You may be able to take a TEFL course and find work as a teacher and make just enough to get by and many people are ok with that.

I think people are trying to warn you that it will not be an easy life in paradise, but then again it just depends on what your looking for.

I remeber a news story my wife told me about a westerner who bought a piece of land with his wife in Isarn and basically lives the life of a poor Thai farmer. She said in the interview when asked about being poor he said, "I'm not poor, I have a house to keep me dry when it rains and I have food to eat everyday."

So like I said, it all depends on what type of lifestyle you are looking for...

But you also need to make sure that if you are thinking about a life style as simple as the one stated above, you might want to check with the Thai girl who wants to marry you to ensure she would be ok with the same...

No Thais are not taxed on gifts. So if you want to give someone a large sum of money you should do so on their b-day or chinese new year or on their wedding day... If it is not given at a specific holiday then it is considered as income and taxed accordingly.

Also you can give money that has already been taxed once to family members ie wife/minor wife, son/daughter, father/mother but not cousins, aunts, uncles.... Yes it is actually in the code that minor wives are not taxed on money given to them from their "husbands" but the money will need to be declared in the mans income.

In my bus law class here in Thailand we discussed a case where the first wife tried to get her husband's minor wife arrested for tax evasion on the money he gave her but to no avail.

But obviously if we are talking about a large ammount of money I would advise you to consult an accountant or lawyer before you give the gift. I will try to find my law notes from class later this week to see if I can find the exact law for you.

With $20,000 per year it will only be existing.

20,000 a year is plenty, you can live a comfortable middle class lifestyle for 20,000 a year. At 34baht to the dollar that is 56,000 baht a month. Thats about what I spend every month and for that I get a 2 bedroom townhouse with all of the amenities like A/C, UBC(cable), wireless internet access, car payment, motorcycle payment, gas for both, all of my food for the month and still have a little bit of spending cash left over for the little things here and there. Granted I don't smoke and drink, if I did it would most definately cost me more.

Quote from PM from Lopburi3

"I was in process of trying to get an answer out to you but really don't know enough to be sure in your case as you have continuous 3 years and don't want to lose that with a visa change. I believe it was said no more work permits on ED extensions but am not certain of that. I believe it would be worth your money and time to consult with Sunbelt if they do not answer on forum as you seem to have too many factors to take our word as law and possibly end up behind an eight ball."

Thank you for your advice, I think I may very well need to talk with a Lawyer but I am trying to collect as much information as I can; otherwise I may not know enough to ask some of the important questions. I know that they are experts but I would like to have a pretty good idea on what they are going to tell me before they tell me.

I wasn't aware that if I change from an Ed to a "B" or "O" Ihave to start the clock over.

If my situation wasn't complicated enough as it is, I also got my pasport stolen with my car and I am going to need to try and get my old visa put into my new passport. I have copies of everything and I have been told that I can get a letter from the embasy and depending on the mood of the immigration officer I may be able to get my visa replaced.

Ok, this is my situation... I am currently a student at a Thai University and I have an Education visa and I need an internship in order to graduate. I have been offered a position at a Thai company and they have told me they are interested in giving me a full time position even though I haven't officially finished at University yet. They also said they will pay for my work permit and visa.

It is also important to note that I am married to a Thai national and I have a Thai child, or at least I will within the next couple of weeks.

What I want to know is should I use the Ed visa until I graduate and then change my visa or should I change my visa when I start working with them? I think I could technically use my ed visa because the internship is a requirement for graduation but I am also interested in getting a work permit because I want to pay taxes, I know that sounds wierd, but I have been here for three years and I am married to a Thai national, I have a Thai child, I will be graduating from a Thai University and I can speak Thai so I think I would be succesful if I applied for residency. The only thing holding me back is the fact that I haven't paid taxes for the past two years because I am on an Education visa.

Do I need to have proof of paying taxes even I have been here under an education visa? Can I apply for residency this year? Or do I need to get a work permit and pay taxes for two years and then apply for residency?

Also since I am married and I will be making over 40,000 a month would it be easier to get an "O" visa instead of a "B"? If I have an "O" visa can I still get a work permit?

Lastly if I should go from an Ed to an "O" or a "B" can I do it here or do I have to leave the country?

What do you think I should do?

The only reason that it may be worth going for the education is that to extend your "o" it sounds like he or you may need to show 40,000 a month in income; this is based on reading many of the posts on this site, not first hand knowledge because I have an education visa. This means that he will be liable to pay taxes on this income where if he has an ed visa he doesn't have any income requirements or tax liability.

It is also very easy to extend, I have extended mine 3 times with just a support letter, a copy of my grade report (this requirement is new this year), photocopies of my passport, visa and previous visa extensions. If you are already going to Signapore for vacation I would recomend changing it to an Ed visa, it will make things simplier when it comes to extend every year and it doesn't really cost you anything since you are already planning on heading to Signapore.

I got my ed visa in Signapore and the only problem I had was my support letter was origonally adressed to the New York Embassy and not the Signapore Embassy so they wouldn't accept it and I had to go back to Thailand, get a new letter and fly back again. I tried to change my tourist to a non im in Bangkok but they told me I couldn't and that I would have to leave the country to do it, but that was a few years ago...

Even if it's 100 million baht lost in revenue, compare that to the annual Thai education ministry's budget, or what the govt. collects from Thais in income tax.

Finally, many illegal teachers without work permits are only being paid for 9 to 11 months per year, not 13 months.

I realize that in the grand scheme of things as a percentage of the budget it may not be a huge number but I don't think they have any intentions of eliminating all of the non work permit teachers in Thailand. If they did it would cause a major hiccup in the education system until they could all be replaced if it would even be posiible to do so; not to mention the enforcment costs in both time and money.

So if they are not going to throw them all out why not just try and bring everyone into the system? They have already set the precedent that a BA is not required so that is not even an issue. It is in essence a way to collect the money and also once everyone is in the system it would be possible to better monitor and even posibly improve the education system.

I don't know if I am being overly opptimistic or not but I have only been here for 3 years...

Good point on the fact that people who are currently claiming more than they make, I hadn't considered that; also good point on the fact that not everyone gets paid for 12 months and gets a bonus.

Also what about non teachers? Does anyone know if there are alot of non teachers working without a work permit?

I was reading about the changes in the "O" visas and its sounds like the Thai government is trying ensure that it can collect taxes from its foreign residents.

It got me to start thinking about all of the lost tax revenue because of the difficulty some people have had in getting workpermits. I have seen the posts by many on this website talking about this. So lets try and make a very rough estimate on the lost revenue:

Lets say those who can't get a work permit under the current system generally make less- around 30,000 a month plus we will say a one month bonus at the end of the year. This means an anual income of 390,000 minus deductions (100,000 + 30,000) leaves a total taxable income of 260,000 * 10% = 26,000 baht in taxes per year/person

Then we have to estimate the total number of "illegal workers" in Thailand - I really have no idea about this, so I will just pull a random number out of the air and hope that someone who has a better idea than me will give us a more acurate number.

Lets say 1,000 teachers:

1,000 * 26,000 = 26,000,000 baht in lost tax revenue and I have a feeling that this number is much lower than the actual number.

We haven't even considered all of the lost revenue from work permit fees.

Some may argue about qualifications or lack there of but there is already a governemnt aproved precedent that I am sure most of us have heard about - the Nontaburi Project.

I would be interested in what everyone thinks or if anyone has any ideas about "better" numbers than the ones I used.

Next update, we went to the finance company today to fill out the rest of the paperwork to include the transfer of ownership which the finance company will hold until the insurance company delivers the check. So now everything is done and we only have to wait for the insurance company.

The lady that we talked to said that the check may come as quick as 2 months but no later than 3 months from today and that it will be for the entire 475,000 then the finance company will take what is owed to them and that shoud leave us enough to put a down payment on another car.

She said that the insurance company may require us to come in for additional questions but given our circumstances it is entirely possible that we will not have to.

She said that they may investigate further if they think that we may have sold the car and are currently trying to defraud the insurance company; I guess this happens quite frequently here as well.

Of course this is all assumeing that the car isn't recovered, if the car is recovered then it will either be fixed to its original condition at the expense of the insurance company or totaled and we will be given the full ammount.

depends purely on the insurance company you got.

you have some experience with them?

got your contact in there?

things can be settled pretty quickly here.

I don't have any experience with the insurance company and I don't know anyone in the company. When we bought the car the dealership helped to set up everything with the finance company and the insurance company. So the first time we had ever set eyes on anyone from the company was the day our car was stolen.

But on a brighter note, I have talked with my Business Law Professor and he said that if I have any problems with the insurance company he will talk to them for me.

In addition to being a University professor he also works at the Constitutional Court; I hope I don't need his help but if I do I am certain he will be able to straighten things out fairly quickly.

The lady that we spoke with at the finance company was very nice and after just 2 days we got a call this evening asking us to come in and fill out the rest of the paperwork thats needed in order to submit our claim to the insurance company. So far things seem to be going ahead fairly quickly but we have yet to have any real discussion with the insurance company.

It will be 2 weeks until I can pick up my pasport but I will continue to update this post as I get more information. I would still appreciate any info from others who may have lost their passports or had them stolen.

If its computerized then they should be able to look it up but they may not be willing to do that. Hopefully your case was the exception rather than the rule PeaceBlondie.

A well educated Thai friend of mine once told me that when a car and a motorcycle get into and accident the car is almost always held responsible regardless of the facts. That being said, the compensation that courts give out are nothing compaired to the west and would probably never reach 120,000 baht for what you described.

But if you were drunk then it may be better to pay them off in orer to prevent it going to court and being help criminally liable.

I have been told that there are some fairly sophisticated car thief rings here in Thailand and that my car will end up one of two different ways. The first is that the car will be stripped down and the parts will be sold off here in Thailand or the vehicle will be smuggled accross the border to Cambodia, Burma or Laos where it can be sold off quite easily.

As things progress I will continue to update this post...

Also there are tons of cars stolen everyday, just listen to FM 100. Its in Thai but its a radio news station that you can call into if your car is stolen and they broadcast it over the airwaves in the hopes that someone will see your car and call it in.

I got my 5 year in January, no problem at all.

As I already mentioned above I lost my passport when my car was stolen. I have put a poll about the likelyhood of the police finding my car and on how easy it will be to deal with the insurance company on the 'Thailand Motor Forum', I'm not sure if that was the right place but I would like you opinions if you have time to check it out.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=134610

My car was stolen on Sunday at Wat Rai King in Nakorn Pathom. It is a very popular Wat very close to the floating maket and there are thousands of people who go there every weekend. We parked the car on the road just outside of the Wat at 1:30pm and locked everything up and went into the Wat. There were people walking in and out of the place cars parked in front of us and behind us and we were parked right accross from a bathroom that had an attendent sitting in front of the bathroom.

We were only gone for about 1 hour and when we came back the car was gone. We asked the attendant if she saw anything and she said she didn't. Called the police and filled out a report.

Called the insurance company and they came out and did their thing. We then had to catch a cab back home and then on Monday morning we went to te dealership and called the finace company. On Tuesday I went into the the Embasy because my passport was in the glove box. We then went and turned in all of the paperwork to the finance company and got additional paperwork from them. Then it was back to the police department to finish the paperwork.

Tomorrow morning we have to fax the report from the police to the finance company and then they can set up an appointment between us them and the insurance company. The concern now is one, how long will it take until the insurance company is forced to pay and once they are forced to pay how much will it be?

Many people have mentioned the number of 3 months but the insurance agent that came to the site said "lie duan", many months. Is there a law on the time frame for payment?

We have coverage for upto 475,000 and we got an estimate of the value of the car from the dealership of 480,000-500,000 but I am certain that the insurance company will want to value the car at a lower ammount.

Anyone ever have their car stolen? How did it everything work out? Any suggestions?

PS-we later found out from motorcycle taxis that work by the Wat that cars and/or motorcycles are stolen here almost every weekend

Yes I have already reported it to the police and yes it was also necessary to give the US Embassy the police report. I hope things do run smoothly and I will definately ask for a letter from the Embassy when I pick it up.

So far 1 for 2; so it looks like it might be posible...

Last Sunday afternoon my car got stolen and my passport was in the glove box. We have been going through all of the stuff for the car, which luckily has theft insurance; we just have to wait 3 months until we can collect on it. ( I will open a post about this under another topic)

I went to the embasy today and took care of getting a new passport, I will pick it up in 2 weeks. The question is what can I expect on the visa front? I had a non-im student visa since 2004 that had been extended every year. I was getting ready for my anual extension next month since my visa was set to run out on Sept. 14th. I have copies of everything and the letter from the University for the extension; the question is will I be able to still do this here or are they going to make me leave the country and start over from scratch?

My next question deals with the whole residency thing; I was looking into applying for residency either this year or next year since I had 3 years of unbroken 1 year visa extensions but will I still be able to do that or am I going to need to start the clock over again?

I would appreciate advice from anyone who has been in a similar situation or may know what I can expect.

I took my CELTA at Elite Training Institute on Silom Rd. The course was tough but I learned a lot and I have been working with them ever since.

*edited because I mispelled a word

Even though school will have already started you shouldn't have any problem finding a job. There are always schools who need teachers, and there will certainly be schools who will be scrambling to find a native speaker around that time.

I don't think it is really worth trying to find a job pending your successful completion of the course. Schools generally take the first qualified person who applies so even if they did offer you something, if someone else came along before you finished they would certainly give him/her "your" job. Do to this fact they would more than likely tell you to come back when you finish your CELTA. About the closest thing you might get is an assurance from where you are studying your CELTA that they may be able to help you find work once you finish.

I would wait another 2 years, it is worth it not to have to squeak by. What if you have anything unexpexted come up, do you really want to have to squeak by or eat into your savings? You retirement should be the time for you to relax and not have to worry so much. Plus if you look at the trend in exchange rate, your monthly income may not even be 35K by next year.

I agree with many of the posters; I don't think there is anything wrong with trying to assimilate into the Thai culture. I am a strong believer that if you want to live here you should at least learn the language; that goes for anyone living in any other country. Many Americans say that if you want to live in America you should learn to speak English, well if you want to live in Thailand... Many people don't learn the language because they mainly associate with other English speakers or if they need to talk to someone outside their circle of friends they have someone help them. It also must be said that it greatly increases your quality of life, this place doesn't really seem all that strange or different once you can speak the language; sure there are some cultural differences but people are generally the same the world over.

As to eating Thai food, I like it so I eat it... But if you don't care for it then don't eat it. Nobody likes everything, so eat what you like; you should enjoy food.

As to clothes, I am a bit of a fashion misfit; so this is definately one area that I don't feel qualified to give advice. The one thing that I will mention is that I have actually begun to dress better since living here. Thais tend to judge people based on their appearance, although foreigners are given quite a bit more latitude. Thais will not treat you as low class even if you dress poorly, but they will definately treat you better if you are dressed nicely.

I can understand why you may be worried about your friend but you need to just let him go and realize that if he is infact going to far and losing himself, he will eventually come back. But he may just be changing and if thats the case then you will either accept the new him or you will find that you no longer have enough in common to stay close friends.