Foreign business leaders call on Thailand to end its ‘red tape’ madness

by Andrew J Wood

 

Hundreds of outdated rules may be heading for the chopping block 

 

Guillotine project: Pictured with Greg Watkins of the BCCT (extreme right) are TCC/BoT President Kalin Sarasin (5th left), BCCT Chair Andrew McBean (2nd right), The American Chamber of Commerce in Thailand (AMCHAM Thailand) President Greg Wong (4th right), AMCHAM Executive Director Heidi Gallant (3rd left), The Australian-Thai Chamber of Commerce (AustCham Thailand) President Benjamin Krieg (5th right) and AustCham Executive Director Brendan Cunningham (far left)

 

BANGKOK: The Foreign Chambers Alliance (FCA) recently held its annual meeting with the Thai Chamber of Commerce (TCC)/Board of Trade (BoT) of Thailand. 

 

The British Chamber of Commerce Thailand (BCCT) is leading on the Regulatory Guillotine project, which will make doing business in Thailand easier.

 

The Guillotine Project is a fast track way of reviewing laws and regulations and removing unnecessary or unwanted laws and regulations, or revising them. The Project is managed under the office of His Excellency Dr Kobsak Pootrakool, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office. The Regulatory Guillotine, now called the “Simple and Smart License” (sslicense), is fully supported by the Thai government. 

 

David Lyman, commenting last year said,  "Red tape in this country is cut lengthwise, it goes on and on," he quipped. Lyman is an American lawyer and former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Thailand. Indeed the project has been on the back burner for the past 2 years. 

 

The Foreign Chambers Alliance represents more than 2,000 companies and approximately one million employees in Thailand. Mr Greg Watkins BCCT Executive Director shared, “Our four Chambers (UK, USA, Australia and Germany) often take a combined advocacy position in discussions with key public and private sector organisations, on issues around doing business in Thailand to best represent our members’ interests,” he said. 

 

In Thailand, in 2014, a coup led by the army chief, General Prayuth Chan-ocha led 3 years later, in April 2017, to a new constitution being adopted and six months later a 20-year National Strategy put in place including a Regulatory Guillotine Project launched as a subcommittee. 

 

Most of the chopping remains to be done, the guillotine project was launched under the chairmanship of Dr Kobsak Pootrakool, a former Bangkok Bank executive vice president, with a background at the Bank of Thailand and the Stock Exchange of Thailand. Kobsak's subcommittee was tasked with evaluating thousands of licenses and procedures that had piled up over decades, taking cues from similar successful projects in countries like South Korea.

 

The team "reviewed existing laws and regulations to see if they should be eliminated, amended, merged or left alone," said Deunden Nikomborirak of the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI), a respected think tank that helped engineer the country's economic rise in the 1980s and has played a pathfinding role in the guillotine program. She described the post-evaluation recommendations as the "four Cs – cut, change, combine or continue."

 

A host of other organizations have been involved as well. The Board of Investment and the Bank of Thailand, which in recent years underwent a successful guillotine program of its own, have made important contributions. Key private sector players are the Federation of Thai Industries, the Thai Chamber of Commerce, the Thai Bankers' Association and Foreign Chambers of Commerce. 

 

The Nikkei Asia recently reported that the reform effort favoured the Prayuth government, has successfully reviewed over a thousand issues which have been processed by a 50-pax guillotine unit.

 

Foreign and Thai private sectors regard visas, immigration reporting requirements and work permits as the most urgent regulations in need of reform.

 

An example of how keeping these outdated laws active can create confusion, was demonstrated recently by the Immigration Bureau who ignited a firestorm of protest by suddenly implementing a dormant section of the 1979 Immigration Act, requiring landlords to file TM30 forms to report the presence of foreign tenants within 24 hours of their arrival. The resultant damage and backtracking was an extreme embarrassment to the Prayuth government. 

 

-- 2020-11-17

2 hours ago, webfact said:

An example of how keeping these outdated laws active can create confusion, was demonstrated recently by the Immigration Bureau who ignited a firestorm of protest by suddenly implementing a dormant section of the 1979 Immigration Act, requiring landlords to file TM30 forms to report the presence of foreign tenants within 24 hours of their arrival. The resultant damage and backtracking was an extreme embarrassment to the Prayuth government. 

He has been harassing foreigners since ceasing power,   Everything about the military government is outdated.

Thailand to end its red tape madness.... Dream on, it will never happen.

Every civil servant, and even the uncivil servants enjoy red tape, they would be totally lost without everything being copied many many times.

Without out all that nonsense what ever would they find to do all day?

2 hours ago, webfact said:

The Guillotine

Perhaps they need the French version ?

2 hours ago, webfact said:

over a thousand issues which have been processed by a 50-pax guillotine unit.

 

Revolutionary eh .. any left over French Aristocracy processed by Le Guillotine unit .?

17 hours ago, webfact said:

Foreign business leaders call on Thailand to end its ‘red tape’ madness

 

Having an endless number of vague, irrational, and confusing laws is absolutely necessary to the Thai concept of government.

 

The very obscurity and ambiguity of so many laws is what makes them useful tools for government workers to use in favoring their friends, harassing their enemies and generating the...all-important bribes.

 

If government agencies and workers were required to follow a set of objective and well-defined regulations…the system would probably collapse.

 

 

 

Edited November 18, 20205 yr by Hayduke

If you streamline a process, make it less confusing, then it's harder to hide irregularities. If a process is it sped up, then where is the incentive to pay a 'premium' to ensure things are done on time?

Foreigners are allowed to import a container full of their personal possessions, when moving here. A friend of mine did this. It required 26 months and nearly 30 visits to the appropriate ministries. He said he was constantly being approached by staffers, asking him if they could help him "fast track" the process. He consistently refused. He finally got his stuff released. Red tape is an under statement. Reams of paperwork. Gross inefficiency. 

20 hours ago, webfact said:

 

David Lyman, commenting last year said,  "Red tape in this country is cut lengthwise, it goes on and on,"

Which allows plenty of "I can help you fast track it" for a price.

They're right, obviously, but I think there's a "fat" chance of that happening!

2 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

Foreigners are allowed to import a container full of their personal possessions, when moving here. A friend of mine did this. It required 26 months and nearly 30 visits to the appropriate ministries. He said he was constantly being approached by staffers, asking him if they could help him "fast track" the process. He consistently refused. He finally got his stuff released. Red tape is an under statement. Reams of paperwork. Gross inefficiency. 

Hope it didn't take 26 months to get your personal effects released? Makes me a bit worried as my Container arrives end of this month. If you had and problems getting your Container released then would appreciate you extrapolating on problem(s) encountered. 

1 hour ago, spidermike007 said:

Foreigners are allowed to import a container full of their personal possessions, when moving here. A friend of mine did this. It required 26 months and nearly 30 visits to the appropriate ministries. He said he was constantly being approached by staffers, asking him if they could help him "fast track" the process. He consistently refused. He finally got his stuff released. Red tape is an under statement. Reams of paperwork. Gross inefficiency. 

Well my experience was quite different, I arrived from England 14 years ago on the 26th of this month, my household effects and other property arrived in a container a few weeks later, I  was using the bulk space in the container so other small shipments could have been put in for another unknown. One day i received a call from the shipping agent who asked me to send my passport to him so he could get my goods through customs. I wasn't happy about sending my passport anywhere so my wife booked an appointment for us at his office in Bangkok.

Before we went I gave the missus 10 thou baht in case any tea money was required. At the appropriate time in the meeting my wife gave me the signal and I excused myself and went to the Gents. A little later I went back everything was complete the agent was happy and we left. after we left the building I asked, " What did that cost/" The reply "Nothing" "What nothing?"  "Yes he was a katoey and I always get on very with them" !!. A few days later the container arrived, nothing was missing.

13 minutes ago, peterpaintpot said:

Well my experience was quite different, I arrived from England 14 years ago on the 26th of this month, my household effects and other property arrived in a container a few weeks later, I  was using the bulk space in the container so other small shipments could have been put in for another unknown. ....

Three years ago, I did sent my stuff from Belgium to Thailand.

It was only 5 cubic meter I needed (75 large boxes in total), so it was sent as part of a container.

The movers collected the stuff at my home and even secured/protected the fragile stuff (like my large screen TV), then took it to a warehouse in Rotterdam, waiting for a full load container to ship the stuff to Singapore - first stop - and then to Bangkok.  Approx 1 week after it arrived in Bangkok, a truck stopped at my place in KhunHan (650 km trip), and unloaded everything.

The whole process took almost 3 months from collection in Belgium to delivery in Khunhan, Thailand.  But nothing was missing or damaged, and I was never confronted with customs.  The cost was also more than reasonable > approx 55.000 THB all-in.

I have just returned from Koh Samui Immigration to renew my Retirement/Marriage Visa.  They did not like the photos we had taken and said they were not clear enough because we had printed them from our printer, despite being able to clearly see the people in the photos.  They said the paperwork produced by the Bank had to have the Bank's Stamp on every page, despite being printed on their headed paper and that I had to produce Bank books covering the whole period, despite the print out from the Bank covering from 2018, also did not like the size of the print of the Bank Statements.  The TM47 had been updated at the office, but the one on the website was the old one and was not accepted.  The only difference is that they had added email and telephone number.

 

if the authorities were more obsessed with the care of their citizens instead of generating a mountin of paper, I think people would be less prone to critisiing their uber beurocracy. 

 

Time for a coffee and relax methinks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

27 minutes ago, Jen65 said:

Hope it didn't take 26 months to get your personal effects released? Makes me a bit worried as my Container arrives end of this month. If you had and problems getting your Container released then would appreciate you extrapolating on problem(s) encountered. 

You probably know by now that I commented on the same post as you did and I would like to help you with advice on your shipment. However I don't know why mine went so smoothly, it could be down to the shipping agent so at this stage there would be nothing for you to do, too late. I think taking a Thai friend with you if you have to meet the agent, one who is softly spoken but very firm and politely unyielding. However I have a suspicious mind ( a good thing if you live in Thailand ) and I cannot ignore my suspicion that there was something a bit iffy about the container load in the first post and the customs were trying to use their suspicion to get more money out of the farang. Just a suspicion.

 

Those are my thoughts, maybe something helps. I hope it all go smoothly for you.

No Chamber of Commerce ever helped anybody but themselves. Back in the US, they argue for shipping jobs to China and importing labor illegally. Where is the American?

There is some hope. The Thai passport office is highly computerised and incredibly efficient. No photocopies of any documents are required. Instead your original documents are electronically scanned in by the staff member. Digital photos, electronic fingerprints, iris scan and electronic signature.

 

Everything is highly optimised, with the minimum of everything required or produced. Passports arrive by EMS 2 days later.

 

If the passport office can do it for millions of customers each year from multiple offices around the country then it must be possible for other departments to follow suit.

20 hours ago, colinneil said:

Thailand to end its red tape madness.... Dream on, it will never happen.

Every civil servant, and even the uncivil servants enjoy red tape, they would be totally lost without everything being copied many many times.

Without out all that nonsense what ever would they find to do all day?

Stairing out the window, that is common practice for civil servants....day in day out.

 

4 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

Foreigners are allowed to import a container full of their personal possessions, when moving here. A friend of mine did this. It required 26 months and nearly 30 visits to the appropriate ministries. He said he was constantly being approached by staffers, asking him if they could help him "fast track" the process. He consistently refused. He finally got his stuff released. Red tape is an under statement. Reams of paperwork. Gross inefficiency. 

He had to pay custom on that? As far as i have hear you must be a thai returnee back to Thailand in order to avoid the custom or tax. Not a foreinger. Is that wrong?

Very unlikely going to happen but happy to see some efforts

A Sub committee. will they visit China.

I recall a story a few months whereby Thailand was being cited as one of the easiest Countries to set up a business. The story was hard to believe at the time, now we have confirmation to dispel such a myth... Thailand is till stuck in the 20th Century (some would say 19th C), lol... won't admit it... 

On 11/17/2020 at 2:25 PM, webfact said:

Foreign business leaders call on Thailand to end its ‘red tape’ madness

This headline alone is pretty damning of the Thai " friendly Business " Model.

Not just one Chamber of Commerce, but pretty much all of them coming out together to fire a warning shot across the Bows of Thai government.

For sure, if things do not change , and in swift order, there will be Businesses moving out of Thailand to more Business Orientated Countries. This has been a wake up call, that could have huge impacts upon Thailand.

2 hours ago, peterpaintpot said:

Well my experience was quite different, I arrived from England 14 years ago on the 26th of this month, my household effects and other property arrived in a container a few weeks later, I  was using the bulk space in the container so other small shipments could have been put in for another unknown. One day i received a call from the shipping agent who asked me to send my passport to him so he could get my goods through customs. I wasn't happy about sending my passport anywhere so my wife booked an appointment for us at his office in Bangkok.

Before we went I gave the missus 10 thou baht in case any tea money was required. At the appropriate time in the meeting my wife gave me the signal and I excused myself and went to the Gents. A little later I went back everything was complete the agent was happy and we left. after we left the building I asked, " What did that cost/" The reply "Nothing" "What nothing?"  "Yes he was a katoey and I always get on very with them" !!. A few days later the container arrived, nothing was missing.

Yes, it matters who you get.  We were helping friends import their dogs and cats.  We were instructed to pay B6K.   We later found a guy that was cheaper.   A Thai-Chinese woman coming back from vet school had to pay B24K.   Who you know or get matters in Thailand.  I have heard endless stories.   

This is really great news, because it shows that some people are seriously concerned about the unnecessary "red tape" and that the Gov't of Thailand is actually listening.

 

We would love to do business here, and it may even result in a relaxation of such draconian policies such as 90 day reporting, etc. because business people do not move their place of business, or residence that frequently.

 

Let's hope and pray that this comes to fruition, fingers crossed!

5 hours ago, Jen65 said:

Hope it didn't take 26 months to get your personal effects released? Makes me a bit worried as my Container arrives end of this month. If you had and problems getting your Container released then would appreciate you extrapolating on problem(s) encountered. 

His biggest problem was that he included his BMW motorbike, which is allowed. But, it was stupid complicated. 

5 hours ago, peterpaintpot said:

Well my experience was quite different, I arrived from England 14 years ago on the 26th of this month, my household effects and other property arrived in a container a few weeks later, I  was using the bulk space in the container so other small shipments could have been put in for another unknown. One day i received a call from the shipping agent who asked me to send my passport to him so he could get my goods through customs. I wasn't happy about sending my passport anywhere so my wife booked an appointment for us at his office in Bangkok.

Before we went I gave the missus 10 thou baht in case any tea money was required. At the appropriate time in the meeting my wife gave me the signal and I excused myself and went to the Gents. A little later I went back everything was complete the agent was happy and we left. after we left the building I asked, " What did that cost/" The reply "Nothing" "What nothing?"  "Yes he was a katoey and I always get on very with them" !!. A few days later the container arrived, nothing was missing.

Most important question is did the wife give you the money back or did it cost you in the end ? ????

4 hours ago, ronaldo0 said:

Most important question is did the wife give you the money back or did it cost you in the end ? ????

 

No, I got it all back. Sad to say that phase didn't last long and she borrowed against our land and defaulted. The legal action went all the way to the Supreme Court and I won. Everybody that I knew in Thailand, Thais and from all other nations told me at the start that I had no chance - but they were all wrong. But you do need an exceptionally smart lawyer.

Before you ask a further question, the answer is yes I kicked her out as soon as the papers from the court arrived.

On 11/17/2020 at 5:06 PM, johng said:

Perhaps they need the French version ?

Time for some rollin' heads, indeed. 

5 hours ago, spidermike007 said:

His biggest problem was that he included his BMW motorbike, which is allowed. But, it was stupid complicated. 

That's easy to Google.