ballpoint

Finally, someone is doing their job...

Actual tourist complaints to travel companies: 1. "On my holiday to Goa in India, I was disgusted to find that almost every restaurant served curry. I don't like spicy food." 2. "They should not allow topless sunbathing on the beach. It was very distracting for my husband who just wanted to relax." 3. "We went on holiday to Spain and had a problem with the taxi drivers as they were all Spanish." 4. "We booked an excursion to a water park but no-one told us we had to bring our own swimsuits and towels. We assumed it would be included in the price." 5. "The beach was too sandy. We had to clean everything when we returned to our room." 6. "We found the sand was not like the sand in the brochure. Your brochure shows the sand as white but it was more yellow." 7. "It's lazy of the local shopkeepers to siesta in the afternoons I often needed to buy things during ʽsiesta timeʼ. This should be banned." 8. "No-one told us there would be fish in the water. The children were scared." 9. "Although the brochure said that there was a fully equipped kitchen, there was no egg-slicer in the drawers." 10. "I think it should be explained in the brochure that the local convenience store does not sell proper biscuits like custard creams or ginger nuts." 11. "The roads were uneven and bumpy, so we could not read the local guide book during the bus ride to the resort. Because of this, we were unaware of many things that would have made our holiday more fun." 12. "It took us nine hours to fly home from Jamaica to England. It took the Americans only three hours to get home. This seems unfair." 13. "I compared the size of our one-bedroom suite to our friends three-bedroom and ours was significantly smaller." 14. "The brochure stated: No hairdressers at the resort. We're trainee hairdressers and we think they knew and made us wait longer for service." 15. "When we were in Spain, there were too many Spanish people there. The receptionist spoke Spanish, the food was Spanish. No one told us that there would be so many foreigners." 16. "We had to line up outside to catch the boat and there was no air-conditioning." 17. "It is your duty as a tour operator to advise us of noisy or unruly guests before we travel." 18. "I was bitten by a mosquito. The brochure did not mention mosquitoes." 19. "My fiancé and I requested twin-beds when we booked, but instead we were placed in a room with a king bed. We now hold you all responsible and want to be re-reimbursed for the fact that I became pregnant. This would not have happened if you had put us in the room that we booked."

Equality.

It's been a tiresome morning, and I'm bored as an Amish electrician, so started thinking about this and that... Like how Hooters missed a major business opportunity during the Covid lockdowns. They should have started a home delivery service, and called it Knockers.

I went on one of those once in a lifetime holidays. Never again!

Oh, beehave!

The calendar year proviso is stated by many tax accountants and lawyers here, and does seem to be followed by the Revenue Department, however, there is nothing about this on their website, or any other official documentation I've found. "Taxpayers are classified into “resident” and “non-resident”. “Resident” means any person residing in Thailand for a period or periods aggregating more than 180 days in any tax (calendar) year. A resident of Thailand is liable to pay tax on income from sources in Thailand as well as on the portion of income from foreign sources that is brought into Thailand. A non-resident is, however, subject to tax only on income from sources in Thailand." Personal Income Tax | The Revenue Department (English Site) (rd.go.th) As they do accept that it is the case in my district, I'm not complaining, but, unless someone can actually quote a declaration that the "same calendar year" proviso is official, I wouldn't be surprised if they did try and tax all overseas income remitted to Thailand at some point, regardless of what year it was earned. In fact, with the introduction of CRS, Thailand could well make tax residents declare and pay tax on all overseas income (that wasn't already taxed by a country having a treaty with Thailand), whether it was remitted or not - which is what my own country would do to me if I was still a tax resident there. I'm not losing any sleep over this, but have considered some options should it eventuate. The Revenue Department can, and do, flag passports of those who they suspect owe them taxes, making it impossible to even do a 90 day report, let alone a visa extension, until it is settled. I know this from personal experience, and from others who have been in the same boat. (In my case it was due to my retiring from a job here and converting to a retirement extension. All necessary taxes were paid, however the Bangkok branch of the Revenue Department wanted to know why I was still in Thailand, but hadn't filed a tax return with them. The answer was I am now dealing with the office in my home district, and not the Bangkok one, and they obviously don't communicate very well. The immigration officer in Buriram was very helpful with this, calling the Revenue Department and arguing my case. He told me that this has happened on a number of occasions, and not just to those who have ever worked in Thailand, with some of them resulting in the passport holder having to file a return and pay tax on money brought into the country before being able to apply for an extension). When I was working here, my company used a multinational accounting firm to deal with the taxes of its expat employees. Before I retired, I asked for some advice from them on how best to handle continuing to live here by bringing in money earned from overseas tax-free investments. Their reply was basically if the Revenue Department decide to audit you, which they very well could, they will want to see your bank statement(s) here and you must account for all money deposited into your account, whether from Thailand or abroad. If you remitted the money from an overseas bank, they want to see statements from that bank showing not only that the account had sufficient funds at the start of the year, but also what was deposited into that account prior to you remitting the money - if you remitted money every month then they'd want to see statements for every month. You must also account for any deposits made over that period, and prove that tax had been paid on them in a country having a tax treaty with Thailand. I handle this by remitting my year's money supply, from an account in Singapore, over the first half of the year and printing off statements for those months clearly showing nothing has been deposited in the bank over that period. I highlight and number each transfer and do the same on my local statements. I then top up that account near the end of the year with money from my investments. This worked for me when I was flagged by the Revenue Department, and continues to work each year at my local Revenue office. For anyone thinking this is unwieldy and unneccessary, I say that you may not have needed to do this in the past, but from my own experience, and the words of the immigration officer and tax accountant, it may only be a matter of time before you are called to do it.

A big shot attorney had to spend a week in hospital. He was a royal pain to the nurses because he bossed them around just like he did his staff, and the head nurse was the only one who could stand up to him. On the third day she came into his room and announced, "I have to take your temperature." After complaining for several minutes, he finally settled down, crossed his arms and opened his mouth. "No, I'm sorry," the nurse stated, "but for this reading, I can't use an oral thermometer." This started another round of complaining but eventually he rolled over and bared his behind. After feeling the nurse insert the thermometer, he heard her announce, "I have to get something. Now you stay JUST LIKE THAT until I get back!" She left the door to his room open on her way out. He cursed under his breath as he heard people walking past his door, laughing..... After about 20 minutes, the man's doctor came into the room. "What's going on here?" asked the doctor. Angrily, the man answered, "What's the matter, Doc? Haven't you ever seen someone having their temperature taken?" After a pause, the doctor confessed..... "Not with a Daffodil."