taiping

32 minutes ago, JusticeGB said:

Certainly absolutely no booze available in Pattaya city not even in Mom and Pop stores . A couple of bars selling drinks under cover in my condo block have been fined 100,000 baht. The only easing I have seen is that BigC has now opened up it's kitchenware and mobile phone areas. Clothing and bedding are roped off.

I am told by a Thai that if you ask the Big C staff you want to buy something from the roped off areas they will say OK. This in a large BKK Big C.

Same 7-day deadline for returns when I bought a fake "Kingston" USB Flash drive from Lazada. Found out after trying it after 10-days. Lazada would not take any responsibility and claim they vet all their vendors to prevent counterfeit products. Sure, which is why I can buy fake products on Lazada today and prove that they are fake.  

4 hours ago, topt said:

I have a sort of linked query. I tried to send back a faulty laptop battery to China about 4 weeks ago. I wasn't sure if they would take batteries normally anyhow although I received it from China in the first place.

 

2 different POs told me cannot and one suggested that I could only use what sounded like UPS......presumably normally any courier would be ok but that would make it uneconomical to send so did not pursue it.

 

Anybody know for sure about batteries outside of the current covid situation?

Some time ago I tried to send a Chinese mini iPad back to China using Thailand Post. 1st PO said I cannot send it because of the battery. 2nd PO accepted the parcel but after a few days sent a notice saying they could not send it and asked me to go to the PO for a shipping refund (which I did). I just gave up on it.

On 3/26/2020 at 11:59 AM, Daffy D said:

Yea! I bought a ticket for the 1st April draw 

 

Will that ticket be accepted for when the lottery starts again 

 

Just my luck, one of the few times I buy a ticket, not only do I not win,  the whole lottery is cancelled 

 

According to 2 lottery ticket sellers here at Cha-Am, if you (like me) bought a ticket for the 1 April draw, this ticket is valid for the next draw. Well, that's what they told me.

So how do I get back the 80 baht I paid for a ticket for the 1 April draw? Bank transfer?

AUSIRIS sell 99.99% gold bars here made by PAMP in Switzerland. I have 100 gm and 1 Kg bars.

On 12/9/2019 at 11:18 AM, BritManToo said:

I'm not convinced they discriminate between an expat and a tourist.

We're all tourists to them.

We are not "tourists" to them, We are "Aliens."

I have used Thailand Post "Economy Air Mail" (ISAL) to post hundreds of padded envelopes to the USA and Europe and as far as I know none were lost You can obtain special "Economy Air Mail" stickers at the PO.

I do warn recipients that it might take 3+ weeks to reach them since ISAL sends items to the main airport in the receiving country and then by surface to the final destination.

If anyone knows of a cheaper option, please let us know.

Is the dual track system Standard Gauge or Metre Gauge as used (mostly) throughout Thailand? I thought they were going to use the existing Metre Gauge for the dual track project.

I have seen workers replace wood with concrete ties on the Metre Gauge, and they used the most primitive tools only, such as a crowbar and shovel. Not sure I would want to travel 160 KPH on Metre Gauge tracks which have not been aligned properly. 

I have shipped hundreds of small packages using Thailand Post "Economy Air Mail" also called ISAL (International Surface Air Lift). All arrived even though they were not registered. However, for one-off items which cannot be replaced easily I would register. The PO has "Economy Air Mail" stickers to attach to packages.  

How much did the Huff Post pay her?

Other TV posts say that TransferWise use 3 local banks, namely Bangkok Bank, Thai Military Bank (TMB), and Kasikorn Bank. I made a test transfer using TransferWise to my Bangkok Bank savings account. The online Statement says "International Transfer." I don't know yet what the passbook will say.

22 hours ago, geriatrickid said:

How did your car, bike  and condo get paid for? You paid for them right?

Put those costs into a monthly basis over their lifespan. It irks me when people talk of their minimal expenses, but then add, I have a car, condo  and bike. That puts you  into a different socio economic demographic than someone who only has 30K a month. You have assets with value. they do not. 

What does a modest decent secure condo go for today? 10 million baht?  Let's say someone has been living in a condo for 10 years and we value the condo in today's value, this works out to about 80,000 a month. If one stays longer, the incremental cost is less, if one is a new owner, it is considerably more. Even if it is a budget condo at 5 million, that still works out to  40,000 a month if 10 years old. The point being that many of the people saying they have  limited budgets, do not, and are far wealthier than they realize.

 

Quality food, is not the processed stuff chock full of sodium  and additives that we know is not good for us. Its the produce sourced from the produce vendors who are not using  the dangerous pesticides that are restricted elsewhere. It is the poultry  purchased from the butchers who do not purchase from the monopoly which relies on hormones and antibiotics and who don't inject water into the carcasses during processing to plump them up. It is the fish purchased from retailers who obtain fish from clean zones, e.g. not the klong, and it is bread from  bakers who don't destroy the  dough with sugar, corn syrup and other crap. And mostly it is being able to maintain a western quality lifestyle eating things like smoked  wild salmon and not the disgusting farmed salmon.

 

 

How do you know you are buying "quality food"? Surveys have shown even the supposedly organic produce contaminated by pesticides etc

11 hours ago, gaff said:

 

In Thailand there is not credit card protection and Lazada usually does not accept foreign credit card, knowing how easy it is in some country to cancel any purchase.

 

 

Nonsense -- I recently had an unauthorised charge on my Thai credit card and they immediately reversed the charge which appeared on the next monthly statement. They also cancelled the card and sent me a new one for security reasons.

Suggest Foundation for Children. I've supported them in a small way for many years and left simething in my Will to them. As you say, better than iPhones etc.

On 11/22/2017 at 6:15 PM, edwardandtubs said:

I see Xiaomi have a service centre in Pantip Plaza now so I'll go there if Shopee keep ignoring me. Wish I'd bought it from Lazada...

I bought a new boxed Xiaomi phone at MBK. After a couple of years took it to Xiaomi at Pantip Plaza. They directed me to a service center co in Pantip. They would not fix it because the phone was a gray import (from serial number), even though I was prepared to pay. Bought a Samsung as replacement.

So, I have learnt my lesson. Only buy from an authorized phone dealer or phone manufacturer outlet.

Rather than just moan and groan about it, can someone please organize a very public wine boycott.

I will go back to making my own vino at a fifth of the price.

6 hours ago, alfieconn said:

Some people might not always know that they will need an FET in the future, take a scenario of living comfortably in Thailand for 5 years, circumstances change and you need to re-locate back to your home country, how are you going re-repatriate any of the funds you've bought over for the last 5 years ? 

Did anyone say life was fair? Should have thought of that before.

2 hours ago, BuaBS said:

Great !  How much money did she loose on the lawyers ?

I did not ask since the daughter chose the lawyer and it was nothing to do with me. 

Not cheap for sure. My own Thai lawyer mentioned a cost of 100,000 baht for sorting out my Will.

22 hours ago, BuaBS said:

 

And that's the problem , choosing between 2 evil money grabbers , bankers or lawyers.

And how are the heirs (back home ) going to choose or contact a Thai lawyer ?

A farang friend died in LOS and I was a joint Executor of his Thai Will (written in English). The heir was his daughter in the UK. Although I suggested a Thai lawyer to obtain probate, the daughter preferred to engage her own Thai lawyer which she found through her UK lawyer. I signed over my responsibility as Executor to the Thai lawyer. The matter was completely resolved after a few months to everyone's satisfaction, even though my friend held substantial funds in several Thai banks and investment companies. The daughter did not come to Thailand.

On 6/26/2018 at 9:33 AM, alfieconn said:

Listen i understand why Tranferwise or their paying bank don't want to create a FET form as it would create more work for them but that doesn't make it impossible.

 

An individual payment is made from TW's  bank account to the customer's Thai bank account as it ses on their website of which i have posted already.

                                                                                                  Money is locally delivered

Your recipient gets ฿ directly from TransferWise’s Thai bank account.

 

I asked Transferwise about a FET form. 

This is what they said (which is what we have been trying to tell you) . . .

"Since we pay out the money from a local account based in Thailand, it is a domestic payment so our banking partner doesn’t generate Foreign Exchange Transaction forms. That said, we always offer transfer receipt for each completed payment in a form of a PDF file available to download once you log in on our platform."

9 hours ago, alfieconn said:

It's not rocket science, a FET is just confirmation of whereby you have done a FX transaction and had the thai baht paid into your thai account.

 

for TW customer's :

First of all you can get a Credit advice from you Thai bank which confirms which Thai bank paid the money into your account and in theory the Thai bank paying the money should be able to confirm from  where the money came from and details  i.e.in respect of Fx transaction carried out with TW.

Never mind about your "theory." Has anyone actually obtained a FET using Transferwise? Highly doubt it because as stated by others the baht transfer is a local transaction and Transferwise probably settle their baht account in a bulk transaction every week or whatever. Therefore difficult to extricate an individual transaction to get a FET from the bulk transaction.