French nationals busted at Bangkok call centre

[webfact]

French nationals busted at Bangkok call centre

By THE NATION

 

 

Ten French citizens were arrested in Bangkok on Wednesday (January 8), accused of working illegally at an international call centre.

 

Immigration Police chief Lt-General Sompong Chingduang said on Thursday that officers acting on a tip had a court-authorised search warrant to enter the building on Soi Thong Lor 25 in Wattana district, a four-storey house modified for office work.

 

Police found laptop computers and signal transmission devices for communicating with overseas clients.

 

They arrested seven men and three women, all French nationals, Sompong said.

 

Nine of them had tourist visas and were charged with working without a permit.

 

The 10th had a work visa, but for an occupation unrelated to computers or online business. That person was charged with working outside an authorised field.

 

Sompong quoted the suspects as saying they’d been working in Thailand for about a month, dealing with clients mainly in France and Belgium.

 

“They told their clients they were agents for a Singaporean company that facilitated money transfers and taxation services,” he said. “They usually worked afternoons and early evenings to align with office hours in Europe.”

 

Source: https://forum.thaivisa.com/topic/1101699-bb-codes/

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2020-01-09

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[Momofarang]

Hmmmhhh, are we going the hear more stories like that one in the coming months? Exit the digital nomads?

[lazygourmet]

21 minutes ago, Momofarang said:

Hmmmhhh, are we going the hear more stories like that one in the coming months? Exit the digital nomads?

Nothing to do with digital nomads.

This was batlantly a boiler room. 

[NE1]

47 minutes ago, webfact said:

Police found laptop computers and signal transmission devices for communicating with overseas clients.

Would they be called Telephones ?

 

[steven100]

This is a boiler room operation .... selling stocks and scamming customers ... 

[Just Weird]

11 minutes ago, NE1 said:

Would they be called Telephones ?

 

No, it would be VOIP equipment to disguise where they were really calling from.

[Matzzon]

2 hours ago, Momofarang said:

Hmmmhhh, are we going the hear more stories like that one in the coming months? Exit the digital nomads?

Please think a little before you post next time. Now you can explain what in this news have to do with digital nomads?

[EricTh]

There are many forumers here who have argued with me in the past that it is completely legal to do online business (i.e. digital nomads) as long as:

 

1. You don't take jobs away from Thai people. 

2. Their online business is legal

3. The company is registered in a foreign country.

 

This case proves that it is ILLEGAL to do online business.

 

1. No jobs was taken away from Thai people as their clients were in France and Belgium.

2. Legal money transfer and taxation

3. Company is registered in Singapore (not in Thailand)

 

 

[Momofarang]

59 minutes ago, Matzzon said:

Please think a little before you post next time. Now you can explain what in this news have to do with digital nomads?

Easy enough: they were providing services, from Thailand, for clients based overseas, without incurring any taxation locally. Hope that's enough for someone that's so clever. Neither did they any any permit to do such work in Thailand.

[Matzzon]

8 minutes ago, Momofarang said:

Easy enough: they were providing services, from Thailand, for clients based overseas, without incurring any taxation locally. Hope that's enough for someone that's so clever. Neither did they any any permit to do such work in Thailand.

Legal call center operations is a work reserved for Thais in Thailand and Thai companies that are outsourching this to countries like India for example. Every other aspect of call center operations or so called boiler rooms are deemed to be illegal.

 

And clever??? I would say yes, and that I seem to know much more about this than you do.

[thequietman]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

The 10th had a work visa, but for an occupation unrelated to computers or online business. That person was charged with working outside an authorised field.

So now, it seems clear that the previous announcement that you could work in other fields when you have a WP are nonsense. This is clearly not a job reserved for Thais due to the language needed to do it, so why couldn't this guy do the work.

 

We are told one thing and then find it is not the case! 

[ThomasThBKK]

 

3 hours ago, thequietman said:

So now, it seems clear that the previous announcement that you could work in other fields when you have a WP are nonsense. This is clearly not a job reserved for Thais due to the language needed to do it, so why couldn't this guy do the work.

 

We are told one thing and then find it is not the case! 

You are right, obviously, because you know thai law better than them, like pretty much everyone on here.

 

Cops don't know Thai laws, why would they? If they would, they wouldn't break it all the time.

They also have no say in this, i would expect 80% of this forum at least knows more about thai law than the average Thai cop - quite sure  the ga or judge will tell them to <deleted> off on that one.

 

Quote

However, and very significantly, Section 37 of Decree No. 2 repealed Sections 70, 71, 72 and 73 of Decree No. 1. Furthermore, Section 28 of Decree No. 2 provides that a work permit holder may engage in any work that is not specifically prohibited to all foreigners on the “Official List” of work prohibited to foreigners. The Official List outlines, the limited number of activities for which a foreigner cannot obtain work permission for in any case. (The current Official List is the same as was last issued under the Act. However, the Official List is being revised and we detail such in part three of this series once the revision is complete.)

https://duensingkippen.com/thailandbusinesslawblog/?p=270

 

 

That's also why i wouldn't care much about interpretion of laws by immigration police etc; that guy won't get into trouble, the other 9 will be deported imo.

 

[gk10002000]

8 hours ago, Momofarang said:

Hmmmhhh, are we going the hear more stories like that one in the coming months? Exit the digital nomads?

I am sure there will be many cases, just because it looks suspicious to the authorities.  Room full of different laptops, tablets, go pro cams, logs of video posts, money transfer actions on the person's pc.  I think it is very likely to trigger the working in Thailand limitation issue and bring that to the forefront.

[RichardColeman]

Wondered why there were no Frenchmen playing bowls tonight near our pool

[metempsychotic]

5 hours ago, EricTh said:

There are many forumers here who have argued with me in the past that it is completely legal to do online business (i.e. digital nomads) as long as:

 

1. You don't take jobs away from Thai people. 

2. Their online business is legal

3. The company is registered in a foreign country.

 

This case proves that it is ILLEGAL to do online business.

 

1. No jobs was taken away from Thai people as their clients were in France and Belgium.

2. Legal money transfer and taxation

3. Company is registered in Singapore (not in Thailand)

 

 

Whoa tiger, you are making a fair few assumptions there.

 

Quote

 

“They told their clients they were agents for a Singaporean company that facilitated money transfers and taxation services

Where does the inference the business was legal, or actually registered in singapore occur?

 

A digital nomad is someone who works online, remotely.

 

A group of people, with established office space is not nomadic in any sense of the word.

 

 

 

 

 

[fruitman]

7 hours ago, RichardColeman said:

Wondered why there were no Frenchmen playing bowls tonight near our pool

They worked in the afternoon and night, guess your frenchmen had do replace the arrested ones.

[30la]

15 hours ago, webfact said:

 

Nine of them had tourist visas and were charged with working without a permit.

Have they copied from the Chinese ???

[Crusader]

Hhmmm...some very petty bickering on this topic, but it seems clear to me - working without a work permit, or working in an occupation not covered by the work permit...DEPORTATION...with no option to return. 

[mokwit]

7 hours ago, ThomasThBKK said:

They also have no say in this, i would expect 80% of this forum at least knows more about thai law than the average Thai cop - quite sure  the ga or judge will tell them to <deleted> off on that one.

'court-authorised search warrant'

[Borzandy]

I would have liked to know their names .... even if they have a French passport.

[Assurancetourix]

When i click on the link ( The Nation ) I get this ..

 

I would have liked to know some names and first names of these French ...

 

[Jimbo2014]

I never see the famous TM30 mentioned in these articles.  Is it the secret weapon that results in tracking down these infamous scum?  I suspect so, otherwise what point would there be to it? ????????

[mokwit]

Seems they were running some kind of scam and maybe the tip off was a request from a foreign government whose Nationals were being targeted.

[Dice Man]

12 hours ago, thequietman said:

So now, it seems clear that the previous announcement that you could work in other fields when you have a WP are nonsense. This is clearly not a job reserved for Thais due to the language needed to do it, so why couldn't this guy do the work.

 

We are told one thing and then find it is not the case! 

The truth of any situation relating to Immigration is always an unknown quantity

[ChipButty]

It doesn't take long for the locals to sus these places out whole bunch of farang arriving everyday and leaving, there was a villa near where I used to live once, something dodgy was definitely going on all arriving in red plated cars and trucks early morning nobody was ever there at night, they moved on eventually 

[hioctane]

14 hours ago, EricTh said:

There are many forumers here who have argued with me in the past that it is completely legal to do online business (i.e. digital nomads) as long as:

 

1. You don't take jobs away from Thai people. 

2. Their online business is legal

3. The company is registered in a foreign country.

 

This case proves that it is ILLEGAL to do online business.

 

1. No jobs was taken away from Thai people as their clients were in France and Belgium.

2. Legal money transfer and taxation

3. Company is registered in Singapore (not in Thailand)

 

 

It was always a grey area. This puts more risk on coworking spaces. No one will know if you are working in your loom... provided you don’t need a ton of equipment.

[banagan]

18 hours ago, Momofarang said:

Hmmmhhh, are we going the hear more stories like that one in the coming months? Exit the digital nomads?

And anyone that checks a work email at the airport, right?

[impulse]

10 hours ago, ThomasThBKK said:

That's also why i wouldn't care much about interpretion of laws by immigration police etc; that guy won't get into trouble, the other 9 will be deported imo.

 

I suspect that would be true if they caught him working by himself, or in a legal business.  But I think he'll be deported because he was working with a bunch of illegals.

 

Still a little disturbing because they were all banged up for working without work permits, and nowhere did they mention that it was because the business itself was illegal.  If I was a digital nomad working in a known shared workspace somewhere, I'd be a little concerned.  They may be fine.  Or they may not.

 

[impulse]

23 minutes ago, banagan said:

And anyone that checks a work email at the airport, right?

 

You do understand the difference between working full time in a dedicated and equipped space vs dashing off an e-mail poolside or in the airport, right?  Because I'm pretty sure the BIB do.

[Elzear]

Incroyable ... mais vrai « unbelievable but true » for those ignorant in Molière’s language..????

Frenchies must be desperate (and literraly stupid) to engage in illegal work. I’d be interested to know how much they were getting paid ? Thai wage ..? 

The Gilets Jaunes crisis in France must be biting hard .. 

But IF Thai cared to learn languages it would give them opportunities.. Non ?

Au revoir,