Searat7

The biggest roadblock to starting the flow of tourists is the quarantine and one of the secondary roadblocks would be the ability to visit neighboring countries during their stay in Thailand. I usually come for 7 months a year but stayed home in USA this year. By the end of this month I will have received both doses of Pfizer vaccine and hope to return in July. Hopefully the 15 day quarantine will be reduced or eliminated for those who have been vaccinated but I am not holding my breath. Will be interesting to see how fast Thailand can vaccinate people once the AstraZeneca vaccine is available in quantity.

I split my time 50/50 between Bangkok and Florida where I bought a condo 5 years ago. I almost bought a condo in Bangkok a few years ago but now I am glad I just rent, paying for the months I am there and storing a few bags in my building.  This year I have stayed in USA because of Covid and hope to return in July for 6 months. Think twice before buying a home in Thailand.

She had better keep the car keys hidden from him because there is little doubt he will forget that he should not be driving. 

The father was only 15 years older than his son. Every day there is some wild story involving mental health issues and this really needs to be addressed.

Next up should be the third runway.

1 hour ago, GinBoy2 said:

The basic problem with BKK is that for an airport conceived and built in the mid 2000's it only has two parallel runways, which in itself limits capacity. For greenfield planning and build it makes no sense

 

LHR, London Heathrow is the classic example. You can continue to build multiple terminals but at the end of the day it all comes down to runway capacity and how many aircraft can actually be turned. But in LHR's defense it was an airport designed and built in the 1950's &60's. 

To put it into perspective, ORD, Chicago O'Hare has seven operational runways

 

BKK can't shelter behind that it was designed in a previous age. It was conceived to replace DMK as a modern 21st century airport, but was modeled operationally, on something from the 1950's 

I remember that the airport has always had capacity to add two additional runways and to me adding the third one should have been the first step of the airport expansion given increased volume (until pandemic) and the quality problems with the first two runways which required rework several times. 

I read on a FB posting that Canberra was not accepting O-A re entry permit (used for second year) to issue COE at the direction of Bangkok. People were being told to apply for new O-A visa which is interesting because you are not supposed to be able to apply for new visa with one still in place. 

4 hours ago, Albert Zweistein said:

I left Thailand the 10th of March. The first sign of the virus was that at Swampy my temperature was checked.

I left Thailand on February 11 and had my temperature taken then as I was heading into Immigration 

5 hours ago, Sheryl said:

 

Probably just Covid insurance which is readily available up to age 99 and easy to buy online.

https://covid19.tgia.org/

 

If you have OA visa you need health insurance policy too. Covid insurance for 6 months is 23,040b for me ( using above link) and a throwaway LMG health insurance policy is 11,000 b a year at my age. 

12 hours ago, Peter Denis said:

>> PM-ed you a Guideline document with tips & caveats when considering subscribing to that LMG Insurance Plan 1 (with 200K deductible) as mentioned in @Andrew Dwyer's post #19

 

Are there any reasonably priced insurance plans which cover both the O-A requirement and Covid insurance ?

Maybe it is finally time to let those with retirement visas back into the country.

7 minutes ago, Jingthing said:

Hold your horses.

Vaccines with as little as 50 percent effectiveness are considered good enough for production as long as also proven safe.

So -- get the problem?

Vaccine programs like this are not so much about each individual. They're about a very significant percentage of the population getting it which would at some level greatly reduce the spread to the public at large.

 

Also I think you're oversimplifying what the CDC is saying, not to potential of the "coincidence" of that date being just before election day.

 

I was just repeating their announcement and I am well aware the election date is November 3 but I truly do not believe the vaccine would be released for political reasons- the stakes are too high.

Today the head of the CDC in USA told states to be ready to start distributing the COVID vaccine on November 1.   Very promising news !
 

Are there any thoughts how Thailand would react to the possible return of foreigners who have been properly vaccinated in their home countries ?  They should start thinking about this soon...hopefully the quarantine requirement would be eliminated.

Usually the buses fill up at International terminal and then take a long time to navigate to Domestic terminal before exiting the airport. The article is not very clear on this unless there will just be one stop now which would be a big mistake.

Most of people coming through Phuket are well healed long term residents who should have been let in already under plans announced for others- just not the retirement visa. I hope they count the actual tourists so they can see what a dismal plan this really is. Until they figure out how to get rid of the quarantine this is a non starter.

31 minutes ago, charmonman said:

I could probably handle 7 more days there and then get the hell out.

I saw a video yesterday indicating that you could stay in Phuket for a one week holiday after the quarantine OR you could leave after the 2 week quarantine and spend ANOTHER week in quarantine at your next destination.  

Time to address those with retirement visas too...now that Elites have been taken care of.

It appears that TE is booking ASQ hotels before the request for repatriation flight is submitted to Thai Embassy.  You would think they would have fixed the whole process by now.

The junta promised that this would happen in 2015 so they are only 5 years late if it actually happens. What I found unbelievable was the BTS replacing their ticket machines a year or so ago but still requiring coins in most machines.