Digger

Digger is the coffee espresso or the American filtered type.

Bigmike.

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Not sure but they do have a coffee machine that seems to grind the beans whenever they make a coffee - you cant miss hearing it as it sounds a bit like a jumbo jet taking off.

Just thought I'd revive this topic so I can ask if anyone has seen my future ex-wife Aom.

The last 4 times I've been there I haven't seen her

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Perhaps the buffalo's sick or her brother/boyfriend/husband has crashed the motorbike in nakhon somewhere

with fax machine.Pattaya has arrived

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The telephone line will be installed soon and Khun ripmeoffs cabling firm has won the contract to provide 40km's of telephone cabling to ensure that the boat is never out of contact. Khun ripmeoffs brother in law, consellor nevermissatrick, who awarded the contract has also stated that the city needs to budget another 86,000,000 baht for the winch to wind in the cabling which has been awarded to his cousins firm stating "we need a special kind of winch, one that works in all kinds of weather and will not tangle the cable"

with another 50m in the bank, shame he did not spend a little bit more and stay somewhere with half decent security.....

I am in total disagreement with Digger on this one.  Foodland used to sell Finish and changed to Cascade and now to Electrosol and both these products clean much, much better than the Finish brand in my DW (unless there has been a vast improvement in the past five years?). 

And why would coming from OZ make them more expensive than coming from the US?

But glad to get another source in this thread as at any time one place may be out of stock (seems to be a Thai tradition to only order after all sold).  I try to keep at least 3 or 4 in reserve.

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My machine is a Siemens European model, and for me results have been better using Finish but I am sure its a personal opinion, coupled with the fact that you dont seem to be able to buy any other brands rinse aid and salt.

As to the cost, I merely stated that its not cheap - because its an import, not made locally - I would imagine its a similar price to a powder from the USA.

Villa supermarket at Sukhumvit soi 33 sells finish dishwasher soap, rinse aid and salt - all 3 things you need. Not cheap as they are imported from Australia. Its where I buy mine so I know they have it. Forget Foodland as they only stock the US product refered to earlier which is not as good at getting things as clean as the Finish products. Sometimes though, the stock control is a bit hit & miss - so dont rely on it being there everytime you go. I have not seen the all in one tablets, however, if anyone has it odds are it will be Villa.

For an expat salary its very low. For a local hire salary, its on the high side + they are throwing in further bonuses, accomodation and presumably healthcare???. I think it depends where you are in your career plan. If you want to do it for 2 years as a stepping stone to something better, perhaps within the same firm, it might be good experience. If you want it to look good on your resume, I would suggest Thailand is one of the worst places you could show. It would carry more weight if its HKG or Singapore.

As an example, I have employed Thai MBA's at salaries around 75,000 baht per month in BKK with little in the way of the benefits you describe. Thai's generally do not make for good International/regional staff so that may be why they just want to bring in low paid expats.

I'd be asking more questions, specifically, what are the next steps after 2 yrs in BKK, where will this role be leading, How important is Thailand in this companies structure (and for most MNC's Thailand is a tiny element). On a personal compensation basis I would be asking about healthcare and specifically what company provides it, what exclusions/limitations on cover are there?, How is pension contributions handled?, specifically what accom is on offer, pictures, size, location to office etc.

Once you have those facts you should be in a better position to decide.

Hi there,

I really need some help!

Im thinking about buying a car.

Im wondering if a Farang is able to otain a loan for a car through a bank or get Finance for a car.

Does anyone know of the best people to speak with?

Please help, I need some info on this matter.

Thanks.

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Any loan is totally dependant on 1) ability to repay. 2) good credit ratings that can be checked over the last several years. 3)ability to find/contact at place of permanant abode of which proofs (at least 2) can be given. 4) possibly proof of employment. 5) whether the bank/loan company want to trust you.

I bank with the Bangkok Bank (although I live in England) so of course you need to have a bank account. banks are without doubt the best to apply

If however, you are buying a new car, try the manufacturers loan company (Toyota Finance; Ford Credit etc) through the dealer

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Gerry I think your applying too much common sense here. e.g:

Ability to repay - not at all, just have enough for the down payment - if its 40% or more no guarantor required for a Thai buyer and little checking done on the abilty to determine if you can repay.

Good credit ratings: From whom? All though there is a credit reference agency in Thailand, hardly anybody bothers to check it.

Place of permanent abode: Sure, take the original ID card from the jungle and draw a map - does not matter if the person is registered in Nakon Knowhere and is buying a car in BKK, its the map of the house address where your registered that they want. No need for the car to be there, as they find out when they try and repossess it.

Proof of employment: Just get a friend to write a letter saying you work for them and salary is whatever you want it to be, paid in cash. No further questions asked.

Trust the buyer: Does not come into it, if they fit the correct answers, the money is there for the taking.

By the way none of this applies for foreigners - getting credit for a car purchase is very difficult and near on impossible without a Thai guarantor.

If you follow the law, I do not think there is much too worry about. Key here is following the law as it applies to companies in Thailand. There is no such thing as a dormant company, anyone that tells you that has lost the plot, or at least will likely lose their house if they have acquired one in such a way. Basically, the company of which you should be a shareholder and director, is obligated to file returns every year which follow the Thai accounting laws. Its nothing too onerous and not an expensive undertaking. Typically, the company needs to generate an income and have expenses. An example of these could be, that you rent the property as an individual from the company and your paying rent. From that the company then needs to pay a proportion of that revenue in rental taxes. You can depreciatte the cost of building the house but not the land. Other typical expenses would be a UBC bill - it will be in the name of the company that owns the property and is a legitimate expense.

So basically as in any P&L, you stack up the income on one side and then the expenses on the other. From that you produce a balance sheet, have it audited by a registered auditor and pay whatever taxes are due.

If you follow this approach and safeguard yourself as to who your other 6 shareholders are, then you will be unlikely to have any problems. The key though is following the law, not ignoring it. The government has I believe the ability to wind up a company if they have not filed returns for the last 3 years and can sieze assets - thats when the problems occur.

It'd be hard to find someone that stupid wouldn't it ? 

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I can think of someone who shall remain nameless but intends opening multiple business in Thailand and Australia ranging from Laundry, internet cafe, Acquiring an airline, boy bar and a muay thai shorts distributor....... Come to think of it, we might get a post asking how to acquire dynamite in the not too distant future as another business opportunity stirs in the mind of the dreamer

Yes I have been there a couple of times. Expensive, ladies are OK, but nothing really special - many have worked in other nightlife venues - English ability next to nothing, you really need to speak Thai to talk to the staff. Like other clubs of this style, your charged for ladies drinking from your own bottle, so effectively your paying twice and they have a habit of dishing out too many drinks to all and sundry from your bottle. The place itself is a virtual copy in parts of Bed Club - upstairs they have white sofa's and there is a pool out the back but indoors and there was a also a disco room with DJ at the back and a live band play at the bar in the front. Overall, I think its a nice enough place, but would not go out of your way to go there.

I now that the Mazda Tribute which is the same car except for the badging and a couple of other bits and pieces is slightly cheaper than the Escape. Purely because its a Mazda (perception = Japanese, even though they are both made in the Philippines on the same production line) will equate to higher/easier resale. I would agree though that in day to day situations, Ford are doing a very good job here - its just they are not very good at getting that message through to second hand buyers, who are still blinkered about Toyota and Honda. So thats why the Honda will be worth far more than the Escape in say 3/5 years time.

Perhaps have a look at the Honda 2.4L CRV - similar price new, but as I say the Honda when you come to sell it, will fly of the driveway, however the Ford will stay there forever and sell at a lower price.

If you look at Whatcar.com, a British magazine, they rate every car on sale in the UK and despite the UK being a very strong market for Ford, they rate the Tribute and Honda higher than the Maveric (Escape name in the UK).

So, we're selling the house in the UK to release plenty of equity, buying in Tuscany and with the left over money we'll be buying land on an island in Thailand and we'll have enough left over to build a basic wooden house - which is exactly what we want. We're buying land in Thailand by setting up our own limited company.

We'll also be able to 'potter' in Thailand as we'll have our work permits (through our limited company) and we've a few ideas about how we'd like to occupy our time and make a bit more money (but we won't have any of the pressure we have over here in the UK as we'll have the rental cash coming in from Tuscany and prices in Thailand are so low).

Dawn

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Dawn you might want to revisit your strategy - its somewhat flawed.

For a company to provide you with a work permit, it needs to be trading and VAT registered. Presume when you mention work permits that you will be trying to obtain two of them or more. Therefore your company has to be generating an income in excess of approx: 1,500,000 baht per annum in order to be able to pay two salaries for expats at 50,000 baht per month per expat, you also need to consider what requirements you have for employing Thai staff - for a yearly extension on your work permit, you need at least 4 Thai staff for each work permit holder. So if your company is owning the house, basically you need to be paying it rent of some 120,000 month to live in that place and then pay 12.5% tax based on that 120,000 baht in rental income tax for the company, before corporation taxes kick in. All of this assumes that the work permit office agree that the business is a valid one where two farangs are worthy of a work permit.

Now its not all over yet, for your VAT registration, you need to be paying VAT assuming an income of some 600,000 baht per annum from memory but that may be wrong. Therefore you also have to be paying VAT to the tune of some 50,000 baht (or whatever 7% VAT is of the current threshold).

Its not as easy as you describe.

This is an example scenario, I would love to hear everybody's thoughts and observations:

Mr Farang buys a house for 2 million Baht in the name of his girlfriend, Miss Thai

There are two copies of the original Chanote, one resides at the land office and the other original document lives under lock and key in Mr farangs safe deposit box at the local bank.

Is it possible for Miss Thai to sell the house if she does not have an original copy of the chanote, or can she just present herself at the land office and make a transfer of ownership without the chanote????

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I would agree that yes the house can be sold, however would wonder if a legal document drawn up which the girl had to sign stated that the chanot would be held as security on a secured loan basis. Presumably to get a copy of the chanot she would be required to obtain a police report detailing that the said chanot had been lost. By doing it this way, any such action would be illegal as with your chanot you also have the letter which she has signed understanding that you are holding the chanot until any loan is settled. Therefore if she went to the police to say its been lost, she is knowingly lying. Might seem peculiar but from what I have seen of the Thai legal system, this might be considered very serious and then become a criminal matter for which she could be charged as she knows full well the chanot is not lost but with you for safekeeping until any such loan is repaid. Might not stop her selling the house, but she could end up inside the prison if she actually did it.

Would be interesting to see what other legal opinion there is on this, or if this completely impractical.

Best one I have witnessed, was when a friend was over from Hong Kong and he told me that his mia noi was moaning that the standing order he had set up for her on his visit had not been working. She kept phoning him short of money. So into the bank (SCB) we go and he gets his passbook updated and the amounts have been debited sure enough every month. Over at the customer service desk, he enquires further. Customer services girl checks his account, pulls up the recipients account and then prints him out a copy of her entire statement for the last 6 months. Then proceeds to highlight on all his credits made via direct debit on his account and gives him the entire statement. Of course, we were more interested in what other payments were going into the account. Quite a wealthy girl and way way more money than he was led to believe she was existing on. The best part is the customer service girl saying you can keep that copy as I show you our direct debit work OK. So matey proceeds out of the bank with copy of her entire statement in his hands and says something like. "I am going to enjoy this next conversation with little Nong" - suffice to say he cancelled the direct debit shortly thereafter....

a 100% true story.

What happened to the food stall idea?

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I guess it went the same way as the boy bar, the laundry shop, the hotel, the property developer, the internet shop and of course the latest, majority owner of Thai airways stock..... I think Billy's been watching too much Donald Trump in the Apprentice TV show

Billy has just launched idea 1,869 

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Which no doubt will join the other 1,868 in the dustbin, awaiting filing for future use

I have said this before, but one of the features I like best about Bumrungrad (apart from Starbucks) is the ability to search out which specialists they have on their website. Personally If I go there I adopt a simple strategy:

1. Look up what kind of doctor I want to see

2. Scan through the online profiles of said doctors

3. Choose someone who is preferably a recognised expert in their field - just look for the professors at Chula or Mahidol and in my experience you cant go far wrong. These are the people that train the doctors going through these med schools.

4. Avoid Saturdays - Bumrungrad is a wild place on Saturdays - looks like the world and his wife are there.

The cost differentials between the best and the rest are probably less than 100 baht for a consultation.

By the way avoid any doctor that shows on his resume that he has worked at a Police Hospital - them patients dont walk out, but come out on trolleys without a pulse.

How long have you been doing the sausage business in Thailand Westy ?

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If that unanswered question of 3 weeks ago is indicative of Westies commercial ability it's best if he doesn't reply. I for one wouldn't deal with him in any capacity.

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Perhaps Billyboy wants to jump into the frying pan with him - sounds like their business skills are compatible

Up Sukhumvit Soi 33 turning on the right hand side - from memory its Wall Street bar if its still there on that corner. Brad an Aussie guy has a shophouse full of imported Aussie BBQ's - whatever you want you can get it there albeit at a price, but they are good.

Yeah Dan that is pretty much the case.

One way to check the biz is by only accepting the return based on TAX payed (as you will get lots of stories about ALL the other income not in the official books). Few people wants to pay MORE tax just to cook the books...

A good accountant hired by you might be worthwhile.

Cheers!

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I think its going to be the best route to take to get good accountant but you have been a great help so to see proof of the return base on tax paid is a must no se no buy

cheers mate

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If you can find a really good pro-active accountant in Thailand, able to decipher company accounts and come up with a definative due dilligence report, I would be amazed. The point I am making is that a privately held company can choose what to include or exclude in their accounts - the odds are it will be slanted to pay less tax, but you should also be very mindfull of how much legal means are ignored to reduce tax bills. i.e if a bar buys beer and does not get a VAT receipt, you cannot include it in your company expenses. So you might be including the sales correctly and then unable to deduct the actual purchase price of the beer as an expense. Then you have the VAT position to be aware of as well. Equally I would be really surprised if any bar owner is depreciating fit out costs, furniture, equipment for their bar. It is so easy to do and reduces the taxes. Short sited approach is to pay cash, forget the VAT and think your doing well. But then your accounts do not reflect the true position of the bar. Any professional valuer will be looking at cashflow, depreciation and countless other things in valuing a business as a going concern. Equally as a buyer, how much of this are you aware off and what to look for. Unless your using a red hot (read expensive) top flight accounting firm, you will struggle to be able to put a valuation on the business. Having said that neither could the seller, so you might be better of in some respects, but also oblivious to what other gremlins lurk below the surface. i.e unpaid bills, unpaid tax etc - which if you buy a company, means those liabilities will fall to you unless your just buying the assets, name, leasehold or freehold premises, without the obligations of acquiring the company.

If your getting a maid be very very carefull about what machine you buy. I have lost count of how many shirts and t-shirts have been ruined because my maid never remembers to change the temperature setting. In hindsight I wish I had just bought a cheap twin tub with nothing more complex than a start button.

By the way my machine is an Electrolux something or other and it cost about 25K 3 years ago. Also the lazy cow uses the tumble dryer for everything even its a lovely bright sunny day as they are side by side and she just takes one out and puts it into the other machine to dry. Finally they also have no concept of weight in a washing machine - I regularly saw her jamming in so many clothes that she could not even close the door - no surprise that the machine flooded and left soap residues in all my clothes.

I finally made it over to this place.I went over there with my old mates Kurgen,Highlander and King Nick 4th ,oh also the gf that we all share

5 lovely ladies greeted us looking very smart in their uniforms.One in particular ,her name is Aom, was an angelic vision the likes of which are rarely seen on earth.

It wasn't just a case of I couldn't keep my eyes of her , I couldn't even blink

I'm going there this afternoon but unfortunately my gf can't make it

By the way food and coffee are excellant and well priced but even if you're a fruitarian who doesn't like coffee get over there and take a look at Aom the angel

Oh to be single

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I know who you mean - she was there on my first visit but not on the second - but I do know that one of the cute ones is the owners wife but its not Aom.

I popped in again yesterday and had a late brunch, well very late it was about 7pm and I tried the croisant with scrambled egg and bacon - very good, in fact so good I had two which is just as well as they had sold out of the scrummy apple pies by the time I got there. Unfortunately Aom was not there again, so perhaps she only works mornings ???

The owner was not there but the girls said they are part of company that owns Laurel Park - so presume if its a sideline, its a sideline of that project, somehow I cant see them doing mass catering from there - they dont seem to have the space.

Hi

I have been considering investing in a bar in pattaya for quite a while now, but there are some questions i can't seem to get answers for !!!!!!

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I know people who own % of bars but not the majority. Of those I cant think of any that would do it again and they play no active part in the running of the place. One of the biggest concerns is the legitimacy of expenses by the controlling partner or front man. Perhaps something to think about if your considering acquiring a share.

Incidentally, I have my own business (not a bar) and I am staggered at what my accounts look like in comparison to what is the actual state of the business. Audits tell you want the boss wants them to say in small companies, particularly cash orientated ones. Do not rely on any audited statements to get a true picture of a private Thai company. Also pay scant regard to claims that lower profits, non eligable tax invoices etc, all go towards reducing profits. In a properly run business, depreciation and tax invoices are the right way to go about reducing your taxes in a legal manner - cooking the books are not the way to go, particularly if you ever want to get a work permit on the basis of those books.

the top spec Focus on offer here now is the 1.8 ghia which is 898,000

but was told it's going up another 40,000 baht at the end of this month

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I have thought about buying a focus for her indoors but cant help but feel you will get stung when you want to sell it. No matter how good Fords are, there values plummet here as soon as they are driven out of the showroom. As an example a Ford laser after about 3 years is worth about 100,000-150,000k less than the Mazda 323. However apart from the badges they are the same car. To buy new they cost pretty much the same, but you really see it when you come to sell. Perception is that maintenance is expensive which affects residuals to Thai buyers. Reality is somewhat different but when has that ever been important in Thailand

Also the pricing strategy is a neat one by Ford - the Focus at the prices they are charging now are comparible with Toyota & Honda, perhaps marginally cheaper however I suspect they are doing this for two reasons:

a) Be able to say they have sold XXX many of the new model as soon as it goes on sale

try and steal some potential Honda Civic buyers when the new Civic comes out in the next couple of weeks/months.

Cant fault the Ford approach, but they are really poor at countering the arguement of crap residuals, but that is not unique to Ford Thailand - its the case in almost every market they operate. For that reason, I will not be buying a focus, despite thinking its actually the best car in its class.