simey

There is a bar league on samui - www.samuipoolleague.com. You could always go to some of the bars there to see if they need other players - usually monday nights. Several bars have very good tables, bar asia for one.

Sometimes the posts on a subject like this seem more split according to personal circumstance - those owning property or profiting from trading property insist it is on the up, those without want to beleive the opposite. There is no doubt that there is a huge investment in the island right now from abroad, a lot of very rich people are banking on the US led recession to make a lot of money. And to those who say the risks are too high to own land/property (ignoring the legal concerns over the word 'own') I'm sure that all the people with foreclosed properties in the dying market that is the US might now be wishing they had taken a risk and bought here, and that market is nowhere near the bottom yet.

Make sure you take your passport down to the agent of your choice first thing Tuesday morning, so they can get it in and back by 2 pm the next day. Then collect it on the way to the airport.

An internet shop just outside of Maenam in Samui was raided two days ago for printing fake money - the printing equipment was taken away by the police. Seems these places are the cause of all sorts of things!

Heres the misconception - that people move here and start a business to make money. It's the other way around, people move here for the life style, the weather, the food, all the reasons that tourists come here. Often for people living here they need some income to survive, and if that does not come from abroad then they need to find a business that pays for the food, beer and rent. You give up on the idea of making good money in exchange for the lifestyle - if you want to make money then this is not the place. People replying are not all doom and gloom, however people need to understand that the money you make here means struggling to save anything, and sacrificing some things like expensive holidays. Personally the business I invested in lost 200k baht over three years (not including expenses) but then my money comes from Europe so I am not living on scraps. The people you see here with money, probably made it elsewhere and just use it here to run a business almost at cost.

I get the feeling our aggressive friend joey talks the talk but doesn't walk the walk, to coin an american expression. If nothing else the poll would be interesting from a demographic (to this forum) point of view, and it's hardly likely to offend anyone. Maybe we could poll how many people posting on this forum have said they would do something (e.g. move here to set up a business) but in fact not actually done it?

Go for it mark, the moderators gave it the green light and if some people don't like it, they don't have to take part - time to lighten up and have fun isn't that right?

2 million, converted to any currency, is still a lot of cash (63500 US), especially when you won't see it again. And on top of that you have the rent, the tax for yourself, the salaries of the 4 Thai employees and tax, company tax, company accounts, it all means you need to make a lot of money selling tshirts to come out on top. Anytime I drink in a bar in Chaweng you find tourists talkiing about giving up the rat race and coming over here to open a shop or bar. In my opinion (and in fact my case) you either need a large chunk of backup cash to get started or you accept that there is very little money to be made here as a falang and make your money, paid in GBP, working in Europe, then just spend it in the bars and restaurants rather than giving it away in rent/lawyers bills/tax.

The whole mafia thing is present, but it's not that you don't stand a chance here. Plenty of farangs make a living here, some very good, and the tea money is sometimes just an extra tax that has top be paid. You tend to get in trouble if you are loud, show off with the proceeds too much, don't show respect, or appear arrogant to the thais....

1. can a US citizen do business as a Thai person would with no Limited company protection but just as a sole trader.

2.How do work permits and the 4 Thai staff requirement fit into this scenario ?

If you know please share, If you don't then lets flip this over to the business forum and ask there.

Thanks

This may be helpful :

Work permits and visas Although Americans have the right to manage their businesses, the Treaty does not grant Americans unrestricted freedom to work in Thailand, or the absolute right to stay in Thailand if they own a business entitled to Treaty protection. Americans are thus obligated to apply for work permits or visas, in the same way as the nationals of any other country (see further, Chapter 19 Work Permits and Chapter 20 Immigration).

http://www.bia.co.th/006.html

"WHO IS ELIGIBLE to receive rights under the treaty of amity? The applying person(s) or business organization must be registered and established as an American sole proprietorship, partnership, representative office, branch office, joint venture or limited company."

So to apply (as in, fill out the application papers to set up the company in Thailand) you must be registered (i.e. currently registered) and established (not in the process of being registered, but registration having been completed) as an American sole proprietorship. English being both my first and second language, I think that it is pretty clear that it would be difficult to be registered and established in Thailand before actually applying to be registered and established in Thailand. To me this seems clear - you need to be both regsitered and established in America before applying to recieve rights under the treaty.

I've extracted the single sentence to give joey better chance a getting through it.

Looks like siegfried is trying to get some revenge?

Give him chance Mark, I'm sure I'll be wrong somehow. Although my information came from the US Embassy pdf document and Sunbelt. Anyway, thats the way I understand this - the treaty allows US companies to open branches here (and vice versa) but not simply that any US citizen can own a Thai company outright. Not a problem if joey already has a sole proprietory company in the US I suppose.

According to the Amity an american can own a company 100%, of course they first have to be registered in the US as a sole proprietorship, or the branch office of an existing company. I'm guessing joey already knows that and has set up a sole proprietor company in the US.

They must have changed in on my box, neither worked. Thanks anyway, I'll just use the favourites groups for the same effect.

Does anybody have a Topfield 6300IR box from UBC? My previous box broke somehow, they installed the new one and left, but did not tell me the default PIN so I can't arrange the channels the way I want.

Joey, you have to accept the contructive criticism in this thread. I'm not sure how long you have been a member, but usually you are forced to skip 90% of the thread posting (mostly huge quotes!) and find the info you want. You claim :

"I know, that's why I have spent 10 years running stores in the US. That's why I've come to Samui 3 times in the last year. That's why I read every relevent forum topic regarding foriegn business in Thailand. I just don't think some people on this board can except the fact that others have done their homework and are as fully prepared as they can be. No business, anywhere is 100% fullproof. All you can do is try to be as fully prepared as you can and leave no stone unturned in your search."

yet you still don't know whether the 2 mill key money is correct? If you are lacking information on the key money, you are more likely lacking information on other things too, it's just a case of extracting that from the data presented here. In the time I have seen Marke Wolfe post, for example, he tends to write very well and rarely states an opinion as fact, for you to not only ignore his advice but attempt a pointless, timewasting mudslinging match is evidence of the arrogance you are accused.

Should have been posted 4 days ago, the date would have been more applicable.

Hmmm, a guy who leeches off his neighbours open wifi signal gets jailed in Singapore, yet a pilot that caused a major security alert gets only 5,000 dollars fine? I'm sure you get more than that for chewing gum. Seems very light to me.

Skidding off the road due to a tyre burst doesn't sound very VIP, or sabai dee, to me. Nor does being one of the passengers in the 1st 3 rows. Chayapum, you say that this would happen any time a minibus crashed, the question here is the cause not the results. It was not so long ago we had a set of posts on this forum regarding the unsafe driving of Herberts drivers ( not posted by freinds of freinds, but people straight off his bus) saying it was only a matter of time before an accident occurred, and it was. Whats expected of the driver is that he understands the added responsibility of having 9 other passengers and drives appropriately.

Controlled driving, and understanding the risks you take. Insurance companies are not the most understanding, however they have a right to expect an insured person to take reasonable precautions to prevent an accident. If all insurance companies worked on compassion alone and paid out every claim, premiums would rise and people would stop buying insurance, resulting in a worse scenario. And before I get yelled at, this is not a lack of compassion for a accident but a comment on views of a simgle case that can have a much worse effect.

I use a small shop called Assign, next to Java Teak in Ban Tai. They have the brochures so you pick what you want and get it delivered in a few days.

Now cmon Claude, the OP made it perfectly clear that the money was to clean the moon (full) itself. Good job, all that stuff left over by the yanks.

This is simply market forces at work - supply and demand. People complaining about the price of the car ferry act as if the ferry company are there as a charity - thsi is business and you go out of business if you don't charge what the market can afford. I'm sure the ferry companies will say to their fuel/insurance companies that it's not fair that the prices go up and they get the same answer they give us, either buy and pay or don't, the choice is yours. Personally I think just over 5 pounds for me and my truck to get ferried over to the mainland for 1 hr 30 mins is reasonable.

If you don't like what you pay for eggs, buy them somewhere else and tell the old vendor why. Thats the only way.

I remember when I passed my driving test in the UK, my driving instructor drove me home and seemed to be breaking all the rules - hands not at 10 to 2 etc. He told me that now I had passed I needed to learn how to drive in the real world not in a theoretical one, and he was right.

Many accidents are caused not by people breaking a fixed set of rules but by people doing something that other drivers don't expect. Not stopping at a pedestrian crossway might be bad in the UK and you would kill someone doing it, yet here doing that causes confusion and more than likely an accident as the guy behind you overtakes and runs over the pedestrian. Here on Samui we have such a mix of local drivers (who I don't think are as bad as reported once you understand their methods), and tourists (applying the rules of their own conutry to the caribean they have rented) that accidents are inevitable.

To the cyclists without helmets, you only look cool until your face is planted in the back of my truck because you were looking somewhere else while I was braking for the lights. Why do you have to wait until you have had an accident before you start wearing the things? You seem to like applying European rules to the road when it comes to how you are treated by other users, yet they don't apply when you want to drive the wrong way or put your helmet safely protecting the back of your seat. For the record I have driven all over the world, lived here for 6 years now, have 2 cars and so far no accidents. And yes I wear my seatbelt, my face moving 60kph one way meeting an airbag doing twice that the other way is not pretty.

They have bad periods, where there are no takers and they go home empty handed. And good periods, where they meet drunk farangs with loaded wallets who show them the wallet before placing it within easy reach.