Seven foreigners arrested over illegal pre-wedding photo shoots in Phuket

[sammieuk1]

Everything here becomes more legal with money though???? 

[alex8912]

2 hours ago, Old Croc said:

I don't see a difference between illegal tour guides and illegal wedding photographers.

There are plenty of local people in that industry who would be unhappy to be losing work to foreigners working in their profession.

There are plenty of Thai prof wedding photographers with great references who speak fluent Chinese which is necessary? 

[snowgard]

3 hours ago, stevenl said:

What is your point?

Him feel discriminated!!! Hahaha...

 

[billsmart]

3 hours ago, anterian said:

So based on this if an infirm foreigner visits Thailand with his private nurse, on tourist visas, that nurse would be breaking the law. 

Yes.

[rexall]

3 hours ago, anterian said:

So based on this if an infirm foreigner visits Thailand with his private nurse, on tourist visas, that nurse would be breaking the law. 

While I am not a lawyer or any sort of expert, my sense is that technically, the nurse would be breaking the law, and assuming that if the cops cared enough or were pissed at her for some reason, she could get arrested.

Similarly, my guess is that anyone here writing a book, for example, would also be breaking the law.  It would be a "perfect crime" unless the cops confiscated the manuscript and said "Ah ha! You despicable foreigner. This is a travel blog, not letters to your Aunt Martha!  Come quietly or do we have to mess you up?"

If my memory serves correctly, following the tsunami in 2004, some foreign volunteer aid workers were arrested (maybe told to go home and that they  could do volunteer work).  Can anyone confirm that?

Edited January 10, 2019 by rexall

[silver sea]

3 hours ago, LuukKoeyKorat said:

Why not call them Chinese rather than foreigners?

 

3 hours ago, stevenl said:

What is your point?

 

 

I may be wrong, (and I usually am!), but it could be his ‘point’ is best summed up in the following very old joke:

 

 

 

A drunken American Jew sees a Chinese man in the bar and goes over to him and punches him on the nose. Shocked, the Chineseman asks: "What was that for?" 

 

"Pearl Harbor! My grandfather was in one of the ships that was sunk in that attack.”

 

"Pearl Harbor? That wasn’t China, that was Japan!" 

 

"Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai ... you’re all the same to me." 

 

So the Chinese man retaliates by smacking the American Jewish man in the mouth. “Well, that’s for the Titanic. My great uncle was on that ship when it sank.” 

 

“The Titanic? But that was an iceberg,”

 

The Chinese man smiles and says: “Iceberg, Greenberg, Goldberg, Kornberg ......" 
 

Edited January 10, 2019 by silver sea

[55Jay]

Crack down on Chinese in retaliation for hiring Yingluck.  ????

 

 

[Cobby]

Very strange 

it’ seems all foreigners can be arrested for illegal working 

but if you are from African country you can sell drugs on the steers of Bangkok while wife’s or girlfriends sell bodies 

is this not working I’m confused 

[stevenl]

12 minutes ago, rexall said:

While I am not a lawyer or any sort of expert, my sense is that technically, the nurse would be breaking the law, and assuming that if the cops cared enough or were pissed at her for some reason, she could get arrested.

Similarly, my guess is that anyone here writing a book, for example, would also be breaking the law.  It would be a "perfect crime" unless the cops confiscated the manuscript and said "Ah ha! You despicable foreigner. This is a travel blog, not letters to your Aunt Martha!  Come quietly or do we have to mess you up?"

If my memory serves correctly, following the tsunami in 2004, some foreign volunteer aid workers were arrested (maybe told to go home and that they  could do volunteer work).  Can anyone confirm that?

No, they were not arrested, but warned that they could not do volunteer work without work permit.

[Cobby]

Can someone from imitation please explain why ??????

[rexall]

11 minutes ago, silver sea said:

 

 

 

 <snip>

 

The Chinese man smiles and says: “Iceberg, Greenberg, Goldberg, Kornberg ......" 
 

I was prepared to not laugh at this, but the punchline cracked me up!

[Charis]

This is really...  So perhaps best place to start is head to all the hotels and convention centers where many of the attendees and exhibitors are foreigners!  Business work and travel to some extent is part of this new world we live in....   Really inconceivable what they were thinking.

[DrDave]

54 minutes ago, Kolantaman said:

Reciprocal laws in the usa would see thousands of Thai restuarants close......darn foreigners taking away jobs......not.........

Not entirely true. I know the owners and staff of quite a few Thai restaurants in the US, and they all have obtained either US citizenship, or permanent resident status - both of which entitle them to work. You may see the occasional staff member who arrived on a tourist visa and went to work instead of returning home, but these are exceptions to the rule and essentially an immigration overstay issue as opposed to a work entitlement issue.

[dictater]

this becomes a thin line between working as a photographer and taking photos. I work as a freelance writer and travel around Thailand on a tourist visa doing research and taking photos all the time, by the word of the law, that is illegal even though nothing I do is being paid for within Thailand. They are splitting hairs here, but we all know the law and how protective Thais, especially in the big tourist spots like Phuket are over their turf, dont do it out in the open. 

[stevenl]

6 minutes ago, Charis said:

This is really...  So perhaps best place to start is head to all the hotels and convention centers where many of the attendees and exhibitors are foreigners!  Business work and travel to some extent is part of this new world we live in....   Really inconceivable what they were thinking.

That is allowed.

[IamNoone88]

These well organised, well equipped photographers and their quite substantial entourage are everywhere conducting a very lucrative wedding business. They must be as dumb as a rock not to have work permits in place ... or perhaps they thought they were untouchable. 

[White Christmas13]

1 hour ago, KamnanT said:

Not if they don't have the correct visa and work permit. Same situation in Australia: you can't work there on a tourist visa, either.

Yes you can it is called working holiday visa

 

https://immi.homeaffairs.gov.au/visas/getting-a-visa/visa-listing/work-holiday-417

[gbswales]

3 hours ago, Jimi007 said:

No one can work on a tourist visa or retirement visa. And a work permit is required for most everything, including volunteer work.

Wouldn't she/he should be able to apply for a visa as a temporary carer to a foreign visitor 

[gbswales]

If the are chinese and resident in Thailand then they would clearly be breaking the law by working as they would be contracting in Thailand.  However if they were contracted in China and work normally in China then they are only visiting as part of the bridal party to take photographs.  They are being contracted to take photos in Thailand but would be paid for and sell their work in China - no different say to a british newspaper photographer

[jossthaifarang]

I thought work permit rules have been relaxed?

[NextStationBangkok]

4 hours ago, anterian said:

So based on this if an infirm foreigner visits Thailand with his private nurse, on tourist visas, that nurse would be breaking the law. 

Some Chinese even hire Husband or wife for short term. How to get work permit for them in Thailand ?

[NextStationBangkok]

32 minutes ago, 55Jay said:

Crack down on Chinese in retaliation for hiring Yingluck.  ????

 

 

No more Honeymoon for Chinese coming to Thailand....????

[Rayscape]

So this should entice the Chinese back. Have they any idea, how much money Thailand is/was making on these weddings??? They are total idiots. So now we need to find a Thai who has a professional license to take photographs? Who of course will need to buy a license, like all the other professionals here in Thailand!!! Apart I have to save to say, the medical staff. Like the professional skippers and engineers, who buy their licenses? Then go out in storms, in a boat, they have no idea how to skipper, or repair!  that has been passed as safe commercial vessel, by a professional Thai inspector!! Killing 45 people??? Well done Thailand!!!!????????

[crazygreg44]

37 minutes ago, IamNoone88 said:

These well organised, well equipped photographers and their quite substantial entourage are everywhere conducting a very lucrative wedding business. They must be as dumb as a rock not to have work permits in place ... or perhaps they thought they were untouchable. 

they cannot ever get work permits for performing professional photography. It is restricted to Thais. There are plenty of Thais who work in this profession. The chinese wedding groups would have had to relent to hiring Thais to do the shots.

[Suradit69]

4 hours ago, anterian said:

So based on this if an infirm foreigner visits Thailand with his private nurse, on tourist visas, that nurse would be breaking the law. 

The photographers weren't travelling with the newly weds. They were contracted to perform a service specifically in Thailand.

 

4 hours ago, webfact said:

They have been conducting work contracted in China.

If someone was coming to Thailand, travelling with a nurse/companion, they probably would go unnoticed, assuming the nurse/companion wasn't actively running a nurse/companion business from a beach in Phuket.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cranky]

4 hours ago, LuukKoeyKorat said:

Why not call them Chinese rather than foreigners?

Foreigners (falangs) should be a term strictly reserved for whitey-round-eye-big-noses. The rest are illegal Asian aliens that are guilty of all the crime and stealing all the low-paid jobs from the hard-working Thais. Or drug dealers from the dark continent of course.

[thairookie]

What about tour leader from China ?  The one who carries a flag and leads the contingent of Chinese along Walking Street of Pattaya.  The tourist police should have them arrested immediately.

 

There are loads of Chinese and Russian holding themselves out as estate agents, a job that is reserved for Thais only.  Rein them in.

[ChipButty]

1 hour ago, rexall said:

While I am not a lawyer or any sort of expert, my sense is that technically, the nurse would be breaking the law, and assuming that if the cops cared enough or were pissed at her for some reason, she could get arrested.

Similarly, my guess is that anyone here writing a book, for example, would also be breaking the law.  It would be a "perfect crime" unless the cops confiscated the manuscript and said "Ah ha! You despicable foreigner. This is a travel blog, not letters to your Aunt Martha!  Come quietly or do we have to mess you up?"

If my memory serves correctly, following the tsunami in 2004, some foreign volunteer aid workers were arrested (maybe told to go home and that they  could do volunteer work).  Can anyone confirm that?

Yep you are right and the ones that stayed had to get a work permit 

[Somtamnication]

4 hours ago, Pattaya46 said:

The article didn't say that they (all) are Chinese,

just that "they have been conducting work contracted in China"

Ok, I'll bite; they were French. 

[ChipButty]

Another nail in the coffin I would imagine this will get around social media