Can immigration stop non-paying hotel guests from leaving the country?

[tolsti]

Good to see that they have paid up. Well done.

 

Please remember the power of social media. They will almost certainly post on it to show their pictures of their wonderful holiday and the food. They will almost always just accept friend requests with foreign names. Ask 3 of your staff to add them Get accepted and wait. Judge the time difference and post in the middle of the night in their zone that they have not paid. Make sure you include the amount and the equivalent in the currency of the country that they live in. 

 

Social media shame is almost as good as Karma these days.

 

 

Just don't do it to Thai customers.

[1FinickyOne]

As awful as this sounds, at this point, it is your word against theirs... though I understand your aggravation, I bet we are all rooting for you to get paid. 

[madhav]

Their daughter paid the bill in the end via Paypal after reading the email. 

 

I don’t know why they didnt pay before they left? Anyhow at this point it doesn’t matter. Lesson learned and got some good information from this thread.

[stevenl]

4 hours ago, madhav said:

I like stories like this. 

I've had it a couple of times, and told them what would happen if they returned.

I never saw any of them again, so no idea whether they returned, but do know I never received any money this way.

[mstevens]

17 hours ago, madhav said:

we have tried going through the official channels and they don’t want to play ball unless we go to court to lodge a case against them.

Which is exactly how it should be.  Without a case pending Immigration should not be able to prevent someone leaving based merely on a complaint - there really needs to be a legal process underway otherwise Immigration preventing people from leaving the country based on a single complaint could be open to all sorts of abuse. 

[lvr181]

Please be aware of the financial cost that may be incurred in trying to recover, against the cost of your losses. Sometimes pays to quit while you're ahead. And I am empathetic to your problem.

 

Another poster did suggest ways to mitigate future 'losses' should the same scenario occur again. If you buy goods/services online you normally pay up front, so payment in his manner is not unusual these days.

 

I hope you have good luck with your recoveries.

[Lamkyong]

14 hours ago, Pattaya46 said:

 

Imprint?  . We are in 2018, not 2008!

Most banks (at least European) do not accept any more payment using imprint/paper.

And modern cards are not embossed anymore, so no imprint possible. 

ok thanks for that  maybe i should have written SCAN   or is that outdated also ?

[SteveB2]

13 hours ago, lvr181 said:

Please be aware of the financial cost that may be incurred in trying to recover, against the cost of your losses. Sometimes pays to quit while you're ahead. And I am empathetic to your problem.

 

Another poster did suggest ways to mitigate future 'losses' should the same scenario occur again. If you buy goods/services online you normally pay up front, so payment in his manner is not unusual these days.

 

I hope you have good luck with your recoveries.

 

True enough...

 

Having been through this before, once the tourist has left LOS the chances of recovering any monies owed to you by your client if they won't pay or refuses to pay is very small.

 

Quite simply, Thailand is not a member of any automatic international multi-jurisdiction agreements that permit the collection of monies from a debtor resident in Europe/USA/Australia/(any western country) based on a court judgment for a theft that took place here in Thailand, and vice versa.

 

However, from experience, there was no charge in getting the arrest warrant issued for the dirty bag who didn't pay their bill. Granted it took quite a few visits to Police HQ and rock solid evidence to get sorted out. (Video clips of date stamped guests check in, check out, bar video, staff present, witnesses, etc. The more evidence the better)

 

 

Once issued, the warrant for arrest due to an alleged theft (quite a serious offence here in Thailand if it involves more than a few thousand Baht) will hang around over the debtors head like the sword of Damocles for a decade. They won't know what hit them next time they land at Swampy.  

 

In the end, a crime like this should not go unpunished - believe me, you'll sleep better at night having a copy of the debtors arrest warrant framed, on the wall, next to the cashiers desk in your business premises.