On 2/25/2020 at 5:07 AM, donnacha said:

The individual government departments are ego-fueled fiefdoms, who care more about their own revenue generation or simply asserting their own importance by making you jump through hoops. Any notion of the greater national good is irrelevant.

Case in point: they spend hundreds of millions of dollars every marketing "Amazing Thailand" in western countries, but then allow their credibility and reputation to be thrashed by individual ignorant airport IOs and corrupt policemen.

Singapore has thrived more than any other country in the region because they had competent leadership with a cohesive vision of the type of state they wanted to be.

yep.  Thais seemingly have proven over and over again that group interactions are challenging for them, for various reasons.  This is one of the reasons every now and then an "organized" coup steps in to get things done, or it takes a royal decree to get some project going, which of course usually has sustainment issues over time.

i lived in Singapore 1990-2000

It was not sterile or boring

Desker road.the whole of Geylang.4 floors

most enjoyable place

11 hours ago, KhaoYai said:

Yes, and they recognised early on that English is the language of business and made use of the language a priority. I believe that the use of English is now compulsory in their schools and pupils are not allowed to use any other langauge within school boundaries. Compare that with Thailand's attitude to English................

 

However, on the subject of starting a Ltd company and Thai bureaucracy in general, we need to realise that foreigners are not the only people that have problems. Ask your partner about the reams of paperwork and  photocopies they need to get anything done.

Not so sure about 'reams of paperwork', I've set up companies before, the application documents are actually quite simple (same comment for app. for work permits). Both items can be set up by own staff, accountant etc. 

More steps to a process, more people involved, more people employed.  Who said efficiency was ever a primary goal?

13 hours ago, scorecard said:

Not so sure about 'reams of paperwork', I've set up companies before, the application documents are actually quite simple (same comment for app. for work permits). Both items can be set up by own staff, accountant etc. 

Sorry, my post was not clear, I should have started a new paragraph. I was referring to Thai bureaucracy in general - I'd finished on the company stuff.

 

To the OP:  According to my lawyer, it is far easier to set up a Ltd Co. using only Thai names at first, then change the directors.