TravelerEastWest

3b Premium Service is it available In Chaing Mai? I am wondering but teh city center and say 20 minutes outside the city in the hills somwhere beautiful.

I currently live in Bangkok and my 3B premium service with 5 down and 1 up and a dedicated IP works great for internet surfing - VOIP Vonage calls and uploading photos to a website I pay around 3000 per month and am happy.

Next year I plan to move to Chaing Mai - exactly where is undecided....

US Embassy checked with them yesterday and most officers are still working at Suan Plu so I would go there where it is dry. Chiang Wattana is still a lake but now passable for cars but am sure no taxi will take you there.

Actually not that wet and taxis had no problems - both ours and others.

I was at Chang Wattana today for my visa extension and there was only one officer taking care of us - although he did a good job and was working hard.

My paperwork only took about 5 minutes.

He told us that on Monday the officers that went to SuanPlu will return to Chang Wattana - I am not sure if he meant all the officers

Cheang Wattana is open, but you can also use Suan Plu. The choice is yours.

Mario2008,

Thank you very much for your quick response!

I prefer Chaeng Wattana unless the nearby area is flooded.

One more thought is the way to Chaeng Wattana dry or do we need to take an Army truck from the road?

Bangkok Immigration Update please

My wife and I will be going today or tomorrow by taxi to extend my non O visa - usually at Chaengwattana.

Is Chaengwattana open?

Or should we go to Suanplu?

Thank you!

Does anyone of our online reporters have any news about Ramkhamheang soi 50 to 60

Thanks in advance.

I am not sure about those streets but near Ragamangala stadium (which is 5 minutes down the road) it is dry and a taxi driver told me an hour ago that Ramkamhaeng is fine so far today.

http://flood.gistda.or.th/

Great map!

What do the colors mean?

WHOOPS. I was just telling my girlfriend about this after I sent my post, and she asked me why I don't just go to our local Post Office tomorrow or Monday, with my passport, pay, sign and wait for my package.

I must have forgotten these different postal stations know each other.

Sorry for the (hopefully) unneeded panic.

Tom

You may even get lucky and not have to wait. The post office for our zip code always has the package waiting. (after payment...)

Sunbelt,

Thank you for your earlier reply:

"In general, a company must show, in their accounts, either gross revenue or net profit equivalent to and not less than the the foreign employees salary to obtain an extension of non-b visa. However, while it is not law, Labor Officers may also require that the company achieve a profit in order to renew a work permit.

If the company is active but not making a profit the officer may give a 6 month profit with a check on profitability at the 6 month mark or they may go ahead and give the one year work permit.

Again, it is all up to the officer's discretion"

I was unable to continue posting in the thread so I started a new one.

I do not need to extend my visa through my work as I am married to a Thai woman and have an O visa.

1) So does your above information change at all if a visa extension is not needed - only a work permit extension?

2) Can the VAT account of a company that sponsors the visa be closed after 3 years? (Assuming the company income is below 1.8 million baht.)

I too have suffered from migraines all my life. I have not had much luck finding a decent neurologist in Thailand including in the larger hospitals or especially in the ER that I tried one time. So, I continue to take the medication I was prescribed in the US. They seem reluctant to give you or even have the proper pain medication for migraines. I use Zolmig 10mg tabs that is of course a prescription drug, however, can be purchased over the counter here in Thailand. It works, but are expensive. I still recommend you try and find a decent neurologist to find the cause of the headaches which many times is anxiety or depression and hopefully prescribe a pain med that works for you. .

Zomig is a miracle drug sadly it no longer seems to be available in Bangkok.

Do you know where it can be found?

Is a company profit needed for work permit renewal?

For example if a company in the first 3 years has net losses but plenty of cash for all expenses and there is only one workpermit for the foreign director is that OK?

At what point if ever is a company profit required for the work permit to still be renewed?

Note all VAT and wage withholding etc are being paid in this example and will continue to be paid.

Look near your office for a small CPA firm, typically in a home office or small building.

You should be able to find a CPA that will charge around 10,000 baht for your financial statements and annual audit tax returns and book keeping will be extra.

I got it to work by selecting different fonts some seemed to work better than others.

How to use Thai fonts with Word?

I have a new iMac with Lion and when I switch to Thai it works in Finder, Dreamweaver, Excel and Open office everywhere except Word. (New version of word for the Mac)

When I open a new Word document and select a Thai font (which I see in the list of fonts) it seems like it types in Thai for a split second and then changes to empty squares.

I am sure the answer is a simple one like check a unicode box or something like that but I am not sure.

Does anyone know what I should do?

correct if i am wrong, respectively if legislation has changed. two decades ago, when we were interested to buy some building land in Hawaii there was no freehold land available. all was 99 years lease.

I used to live in Hawaii and I have never heard of a law such as you mention.

You can buy a Fee simple or lease hold interest in Hawaii with leaseholds being less expensive naturally. leaseholds in Hawaii are for different lengths of time not only 99 years.

Gee some of you are harsh.

The guy is merely telling a story of what can happen when things don't go as planned and your comfortable retirement becomes less comfortable.

OP, you have bravely opened yourself up to all sorts of derogatory comments but I, for one, thank you for reminding me that no matter how well I may plan things that sometimes things out of my control can have a severe detrimental impact on future plans.

Good luck to you and I hope all turns out well.

Wallaby - very well said. The OP did not ask for advice - but in this forum he knows he will get it before he posted. I echo others in that you need to hold steady on the car as it will hurt your financial health which in turn will hurt everything else. Best of luck to you!

The discussion on budgets is relative. If you have a simple but comfortable house with new airconditioning (important as inverter ACs save money and new ones are quiet and clean etc..) 2 adults and 2 kids - with kids in a private Thai school you are looking at at least 80,000 baht per month - living a simple life - no car rarely eating out etc..

If you add a car and overseas vacations and so on which is fairly normal for a middle class life your budget very roughly will double or more.

Add in a top International school in Bangkok and as others have stated you are far above 200,000 baht per month. If you have more than 2 kids quite far above 200,000 per month.

"...but if i were you, i would not follow the trend in thailand.

rather i would keep my kid with me til he is about four or so, preferably around five or six, before i would send him out to a school....

whatever he would learn in school at three or so can never be able to replace what he could learn from mom and dad at home at that very tender age....

why allow strangers-teachers, some aren't even duly qualified nor certified according to western educational requirements and standards, to teach or mold your kids....

at that tender age bracket, they are most susceptible to ideas and practices and habits.... that may or may not be acceptable to us farang..."

A good point - however, having kids in school at a young age teaches social skills.

In Thailand getting used to homework and learning to read at a young age is something - probably good - I think...

So assuming the school is a good one early education is probably the best way to go..

Double post forum software error

"There is still absolutely no need for anti virus software on a Mac"

I thought that IT pros often advise antivirus software when a Mac is used in a business as it is possible to receive an email from a Windows computer with a virus and then although your Mac may be fine you can then send that virus out via email to another Windows computer and casue a problem.

Do you disagree?

I am about to buy an iMac which will be used in a business and plan to buy ESET's Mac antivirus software as I have a low tolerance for problems.

Another useful link it seems that international regsitered mail tracing is being developed although currently it is a beta version:

http://track.thailandpost.co.th/trackinternet/Default.aspx?lang=en

I understand your frustration, but if you stay calm all will be well.

First, call the main Bangkok mail center - they speak English and give them your tracking number. Ask them to trace the package and call you back if they need time to research.

Unless, the IRS has changed its rules your mailing date is what counts and you can provide your ems receipt as proof of mailing.

EMS is quite reliable although every now and then there is a problem which is usually fixed within a week.

Ok, maybe i just had bad luck many times as I have never been able to track an AIRMAIL parcel on Usps.com as well as on Thaipost after the parcel left Thailand. But i am sure that it's impossible to track AIRMAIL parcels for most of European countries.

And i mentioned Thai post because you can usually track parcels delivery on both Thai post and country of delivery websites, as EMS, but maybe not for Airmail parcels to USA.

Next an EMS parcel will be late I will ask a refund again to see if they now accept to refund, what they never did in the past. Do you know what is the official delivery delay for EMS ? And at which point can you get refund ?

Thanks for your info.

Registered airmail in the USA is not true tracking like EMS, however, you can:

1) See final delivery status

2) See delivery attempts - usually only one

3) Your customer can use the registered mail number if a delivery attempt was made to reschedule, or pickup at the local post office.

4) Please test the above yourself on 5 or 6 packages within the last 2 months and let use know your results

5) If you ask the Thai post office on the phone they can tell you the exact flight number and date that registered mail leaves Thailand. But they are lazy and don't like to..

EMS to Thailand

I have asked 5 or 6 times what the delivery time for a refund is and never get an exact answer... but 2 weeks or more and I apply for and get 100% refunds except for when they claim customs caused the delay.

http://www2.thailandpost.co.th/CMCD/Web%20Link%20Registration.htm is an interesting page on the Thai post office site that looks incomplete but may be helpful.

I only check registered mail to the US and only then when we have a problem. When I say most countries allow registered mail information I mean most countries that we do business with which does not include Africa, South America and most 3rd world countries althought we do use EMS to China and a number of other countries. My apologies if I was not clear.

"EMS takes more than 1 week only when US customs are slow, but EMS does not refund if the parcel arrived less than 1 week to US after shipping but has not been delivered in time because of US customs."

You are simply wrong - we get refunds on a regular basis - from late EMS that has nothing to do with customs.

You are correct that sometimes the post office will not make a refund claiming that customs help up a package. Personally I have my doubts as to how often customs is to blame but there is not much we can do about those times when they blame customs.

The US mail is quite slow these days - the same package mailed via registered airmail to the UK takes around a week while it takes 3 weks on average to the US. Why - I don't know...

Still waiting for evidence, and i would love to be wrong because it would show that Thai post has improved its service.

Registered mail to the USA can be tracked here after a delivery attempt is made and delivery is also shown http://www.usps.com/shipping/trackandconfirm.htm

The US post office is responsible for the information. Why do you mention the Thai post office?

As a side note mailmen often are sloppy about leaving delivery attempt notes - they forget or put them in a bad place etc.

Also some countries like Taiwan will actually call people if regsitered mail cannot be delivered. Great service.

Good dental cleanings can be hard to find as for some reason dentists do them here and they are in a hurry...

As compared to dental assistants etc who do them in the States