josephbloggs

Years ago I went to Por Tek Tung HQ, near Sampantawong and said that I had seen a documentary of them on TV, got the full treatment, including a hour and a half of the grossest videos in their professional video editing booth (pre digital), couldn't really leave, bringing in kanom and coffee etc. Do you want to see the rescue of the train that derailed at Nakhon Phatom?

All around there are shops selling all the accessories for their private rescue vehicles. It's worth a look if your in the area, don't mention the word video though. Also a good chinese temple opposite that was very friendly during Gin Je, Sancho Hong Kong I think.

They also did a good job after the tsunami.

Because of these rescueworkers i don't dare to carry much cash with me in Thailand. I read too many story's of them cleaning wallets of victims first.

For me this is as low as it can get. Thailand really has to stop this but even the Police can't do it! They need the army to help and even then it takes 4 hours!

Thainess at it's finest.

So let me get this straight......you don't ever carry much money with you in case you somehow get in to a car crash and then in case it is serious enough that you need rescuing and then in case one of the rescue workers then steals your money. Really? I mean, really?

Another thing to point out is that the domain name you choose has to be the same as your company name or obviously closely related to it (for example your company initials). And, as already mentioned, you do have to send them a copy of your company registration and VAT certificate.

Just to reinforce what the others are saying: when you enter just go straight down two levels and it will be half empty. So many people just drive round and round and round and double park on level five so they don't have to go up or down the stairs or in the lift to get to the terminal. Utter laziness.

Nope, they don't have it.

250 baht per day.

I will draw a circle with a 615m radius centered on this building on my map of Bangkok and be sure not to enter that area once its built.

Ok, you do that, because, yeah, it's going to fall over on you. And draw your circles around all the other skyscrapers here too.

My God this forum is getting more depressing by the day,

"Isn't this "10,000" figure already out of date?"

There was some talk recently about raising this figure, as it seems hopelessly out of date. But as per usual for Thailand, all talk and no action, so assume that it remains 10,000 baht?

http://www.customs.go.th/wps/wcm/connect/custen/travellers/arriving+in+thailand/arrivinginthailand

There were threads/articles on this aspect here and elsewhere, ~ 4 July.

There also was a "clampdown" on enforcement, on or about 1 July - I arrived 1 July and noticed quite a but of new signage and activity, but again, This is Thailand, so this clampdown lasted a day or two.

There were threads and/or articles on this, ~ 2 July.

Quote from an article:

The proposed new limit is in the range of 80,000 to 100,000 baht, the source said, adding that the current duty-free limit is too low and not in line with economic circumstances.

The trip to the Customs line may be a little less stressful soon, if the Customs Department amendments pass. The 10,000-baht import duty-free restriction has been in place for several decades and is not in accordance with the increased income of Thais and foreigners.

The Customs Department recently raised the limit on the amount of money each traveller can take out of the country to 500,000 baht from 50,000 baht previously to comply with the growing value of cross-border trade.

The Customs Department this week caused panic among both passengers and airline crews by posting signs announcing the enforcement of the limit at Suvarnabhumi airport, saying if personal goods including new clothes, shoes and bags in non-commercial form exceeding the 10,000-baht limit are brought into Thailand, they must be declared to customs officials and the duty paid before their baggage goes through the X-ray machine.

FWIW, arriving on TG they do play a video outlining Thai Customs regulations, and it seemed like you could get a 10,000 baht exemption for goods purchased overseas, and an additional 20,000 baht for goods purchased in-flight or upon arrival, but I'll admit to perhaps not exactly understanding the wording of this video.

For me, over ~ 20 years (or about 150 arrivals) Customs officials ask that I put one or more of my checked bags through the X-Ray machine. Maybe three times they ask what is in my bags, they have never conducted a more thorough search (thank goodness). I can only assume that they have specific profiles, and/or tips, which might move them to conduct more thorough searches?

Flew in from Shanghai tonight on TG. During descent they showed a video from the Thai Customs Department. It was awfully made and badly dubbed but there you go. They made a big point of the 10,000 baht thing and the penalties. I flew in on the same flight about three weeks ago and we weren't shown this video so it is a new thing. But walking out from baggage claim absolutely nobody was checked that I saw.

Looks like the "Express" has been officially scrapped. On the trains, above the doors, where they have the map of stations there used to be a blue line showing the City stations and a red line between Makkasan and Suvarnabhumi showing the express. These have now been replaced and no there is no sign of the express line at all. I just got the train from Suvarnabhumi tonight and the Express area was completely roped off and shut down. I think they have given up. Whether or not this will change when they have done their maintenance and all the trains are back in service I don't know, but changing the station map on the trains would indicate it is permanent to me.

No complaints other than about the rather unfriendly immigration officials.

Coming off the plane into the land of smiles those people are the first Thai you come in contact with.

I sincerely hope the new executive will take note.

Generally this is true, but which country does have smiling friendly immigration officials?

Last time through I had written the wrong visa number. I was very surprised when the immigration officer pointed it out in perfect English (calling me "sir") with a big smile and helped me put the correct number in.

I guess he was probably new....

The place is an eyesore, a dump and the worst airport on the planet. It feels cold an unwelcoming and is bloody he'll to get around. Bulldoze the useless piece of junk

A quite ridiculous statement. It's not an outstanding airport by any means and it does have it's flaws, but it's not that bad. I travel a lot and I'd take Suvarnabhumi over dozens of other airports any day.

You want a dump of an airport? Try Manila. Try KLIA 2.

"The improvements are also geared toward reinforcing the image of Suvarnabhumi being an 'Airport of Smiles'"

Please, make me smile, next time I come to Suvarnabhumi and not have to stand and wait for hours on that horrible immigration queue.

Haven't been through there in a few months have you....

Same here. Within the login.asp file is an error message:

Sorry, you cannot do this transaction at the moment. Please try again later

If you have any questions or need assistance, Please call 02 777 7777 to contact SCB Easy Call Center.

Busted - hopefully they fix soon.

Thanks guys.

Hope they sort it out soon - I have bills to pay! But yeah, typical for it to break on a Friday afternoon....

They fixed it - it's working again. Woo Hoo!!

Same here. Within the login.asp file is an error message:

Sorry, you cannot do this transaction at the moment. Please try again later

If you have any questions or need assistance, Please call 02 777 7777 to contact SCB Easy Call Center.

Busted - hopefully they fix soon.

Thanks guys.

Hope they sort it out soon - I have bills to pay! But yeah, typical for it to break on a Friday afternoon....

Hi guys,

All of a sudden I can't log in to my SCB online banking. I go to the normal login page, enter my username and password and hit "login". Then normally you are in. But now when I do that it just downloads a file in my browser called LOGIN.ASP which I can't open. Why is it doing this? Is anyone else having this problem?

I am on OSX 10.9.5 and I've tried in both Safari and Chrome. Same thing happens.

Thanks for any insight.

Came on 26th Abu Dhabi Bangkok with Etihad and plane a little over half full..first time I have ever traveled Etihad in 15years and flight not been pretty well full

Nice hotel I always stay in Bangkok had 6 rooms on 4 floors(40plus rooms ) occupied.

Met a friend who flew in with Thai from London and every one had 3/4 seats to lie on..plane empty

I flew back from London and Dubai recently on the Emirates A380. Business class was about 10% full. The stewards said this flight used to always always be full (or very busy) to Bangkok. They said economy had more than 200 empty seats too.

It's definitely noticeably quieter.

"We feel like we are not safe as there are no people to help us," a Burmese worker named Soe Min Htet told the Irrawaddy. "Here, our citizens are vulnerable to unfair treatment and are always looked down upon."

Welcome to Thailand. Now you know how we 'rich' farang feel.

Are you serious? A bit of double charging in national parks, an occasional taxi who won't use the meter. Are you seriously comparing that to how Burmese are treated here?

BREAKING NEWS

Koh Tao police offers one million baht cash if evidence proves they are implicated in abuse of Burmese suspects

So the KT police feel as confident as the Poo yai challenging anyone to find they are implicated in anything ?

Exceedingly arrogant and seems to be a new trend here...

It also means there is more money in rewards to find a wrongdoing in either the police or an influential family than there is to find or catch the murderers.... how sick is that ?

Pathetic.

Incorrect. I think you'll find that J Bradley just "hilariously" posted in big letters to make it look like a real news story. It isn't. My gosh he's such a wag.

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

Someone needs to learn about biometrics and facial recognition software.

And someone needs to learn that the capabilities of real world facial recognition software falls far short of the fantasy variant in use in Hollywood.

The only 100% way to ensure re-entry into the Kingdom following blacklisting etc relies on good old corruption.

Chap I know got busted in an office in Thonglor without work permit. Along with about 6 others, he was bundled into court, convicted, blacklisted and on a plane back to Europe in 24 hours flat.

Paid THB250,000 of which 150K took care of the court records, 50K sorted the immigration officer who deleted the mark on the database; which left 50K for the "broker" fee.

In the 18 months since he was busted, he's been back 3 times on tourist visas to see his girlfriend. No one's said a single word to him.

Good oh. I hope his boiler room is doing well.

It's Thailand's answer to stopping school kids buying alcohol when they are supposed to be at school. Of course there is no similar ban on tobacco sales for some reason.

What is grossly more aggravating is when you are half way through a meal and are told - sorry it's past 2pm and you are sitting there with your wife trying to enjoy a leisurely lunch and having consumed one drink already.

Then lots if things don't make much sense in Thailand so it's sort of par for the course really

Where are you eating this meal ?

7/11 - Tescos - Big C ?

All restaurants and bars sell alcohol between these times

Sent from my GT-N7100 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

No they don't - you are utterly wrong. In Bangkok at least I'd say the majority of restaurants don't serve you after 2pm. Some do, but many many don't. Of course small local restaurants tend to turn a blind eye. Even the House of Beers (Thonglor) - which is clearly a bar but could also come under the restaurant banner - has been told by the police they can't serve alcohol between 2pm and 5pm and they now don't. Which is shit if you want to have a nice leisurely Sunday afternoon beer as I used to enjoy.

it's not an actual law, if it were Villa Market would not be selling all hours. Foodland used to but stopped. Had a similar thing the other day at max value cashier said it was five minutes to 11 and gave beer to the security man to put back on the shelf. I took it off him, she said 3 minutes, I went round and looked at the time on the till and it was 11!, idiots.

Villa has always been a safe bet for afternoon sales but when I was in there the other day they now display signs in the booze section stating booze, by law, can only be sold between 11am and 2pm and 5pm and midnight - they never used to have these signs - and all the wine girls are nowhere to be seen during that time. Thankfully they still let you buy but for how much longer I don't know.

Yep. True 30Mbps here and it has been pants recently.

Not quite sure how you would translate "douchebag" or "you ahole " into Japanese, neither words exist as an insult..... You of course could literally translate ahole Or Kommon no anna as it would be, but it would not really be an insult. Would be interested in seeing the translations.

Calling somebody the stinky hole that feces get ejaculated from would not be an insult? I actually thought there was a few Japanese words that covered this orifice when it came to insults.

You ejaculate feces? I think there's something wrong with your plumbing.

Yes it's a full body scanner. I think they've had it a while. And no they don't have them in the fast track lane at all, just your regular X-ray machines.

I think its all a misunderstanding. Someone said they must do something about all the hookers in Pattaya...