Thailand lures the rich as tourism revival hope fades

[kentrot]

Along with the strict quarantine rules ...

 

and the ridiculous 90 day checks (I've lived here 18 years in our same house with my Thai wife and STILL have to report in like a convict on parole) ....

 

is a banking system which shows little regard for it's customers. 

 

My monthly pension arrived in Bangkok Bank last Friday on the last day of the month as usual. It is now the 6th day since then and they still have not gotten around to depositing it in my account. Granted this is a long weekend. However years ago this was an automatic transaction completed within hours. Now for some reason (we can only guess) it has to be checked manually by staff who don't work on weekends or any of the numerous holidays. Not world class service !

 

On the street outside my village half of the ATM machines have been removed and the other half are filthy and poorly maintained.

 

This is not the kind of service that will attract more self sufficient retirees.

[Lacessit]

16 minutes ago, Susco said:

 

And of course the Western media is innocent of doing exactly the same about the Russian and Chinese vaccines

The Western media is going on the facts it can get hold of, such as the 50% efficacy of Sinovac. R&C disinformation includes the story of 11 or 20 nuns dying after being vaccinated for COVID using AZ, Pfizer..... insert whatever is wanted.

Many people in the West don't realize Facebook and Twitter have been weaponized by totalitarian states. That's not to say Fox News has not done its own share of weaponizing.

[Surasak]

2 hours ago, sirineou said:

"The new visa package, which if all goes to plan will be announced in June, "

Well ,let's  see if anything comes out of this. At the very least eliminating the 90 day reporting would be a step in the right direction. 

A good start would be to update their computer systems to something more in line with Windows 10, instead of MS-DOS and so slow, over worked servers.

[NemoH]

3 hours ago, impulse said:

Thailand lures the rich with yet another big, juicy nuthin' burger.

 

If they wanna attract anybody, they need to get their population vaccinated so they can do away with the quarantine.  Until the quarantine requirement goes away, nothing will work.

 

Yep lure them here on all the assumptions:

1.    Assuming they are rich and dense so that you can treat them like 5th class citizens or criminals which requires 90 days reporting, notification of change of address and also call them ''aliens",

2.    Assume they dont drive but have drivers 'but they themselves cannot drive unless they convert to Thai driving license

3.    Assuming they are rich and they dont need car loans or house loans or loans stock leverage even for instalments because no Thai Bank will approve their loans.

4.    Assuming they have their own credit card and don't need any Thai bank credit card - which no Thai Bank will give them unless they get security

5.    Assuming they are all single - but if they get married to a Thai - all their wealth will go to their Thai wives.

6.    Assuming that they no longer want children because they will never ever have parental rights unless the court of their wives grant it to them - good and bad..lol

7.    Lastly, assuming that these millionaires want to spend all their money here when there is now greater competition for their money. 

[daftdada]

 

"Traditional Thai dancers wearing protective face shields..."

 

==

The Thai government, not different than most, want to make people live as if there is a permanent pandemic, to keep control over them, and to introduce ‘Covid-certification’ to restrict where they can and cannot go, how else can the Davos crowd keep Project Fear going without masks? It’s the only way we’d know that these were not ‘normal’ times. Which is, of course, precisely why they were originally introduced when deaths had dwindled to very low numbers.

Rule by fear, same same.

 

[Poet]

6 minutes ago, ThailandRyan said:

But they will care that the places close down by 10, 11 pm, and you can not dine-in or drink a glass of wine with your dinner.  There are no National Parks, Historic venues and such open either for the near foreseeable future and hotels that were closed will stay closed and those that are open have at best a 3 month liquidity of cash.  Quarantines for those vaccinated is now 14 days again, and who in their right mind, unless you are returning here to get home, would really even punish themselves for a 2 to 4 week vacation.  Of course that is my opinion and view and we agree to disagree on your view as well.  People may have money since they saved during the pandemic for those that worked, but it does not mean they are willing to throw it away when they can go elsewhere and vacation with no quarantines in place for the same prices.

Honestly, at this stage, people just want to get the Hell out of their countries, to feel as if they are alive and part of the world again.

Once you have millions of tourists back in Thailand, you can informally allow the businesses that serve them to re-open. It would be pretty easy to lift the various lockdown restrictions for them. You could, perhaps, insist that any Thai customers be vaccinated, just as the foreigners are.

The whole point is to save those business that are about to run out of runway, and to allow those workers who have been inactive for a year to start earning wages and tips again.

None of this has to be complicated. Pleasing an intake of tourists who are coming from the most boring year in their lives will not be difficult. Nothing has to be perfect.

It is only important that Thailand get back into motion, rather than have all those vaccinated, biologically safe tourists go to Vietnam instead.
 

[Sydebolle]

Thank you, you just made my day

"There are government moves afoot to make the kingdom more appealing" - the statement of the century. The only moves I can see are mostly to the benefit of the selected few leaving houses of ill repute by private airplane heading towards lower Northeast. For the rest it seems that they prepare water cannons and, in the future possibly even flame throwers ...... to rid all sorts of viruses that is ???? 

[darren84310]

The very people we've spent the past 10 years treating like absolutely s**t  WE NEED YOU NOW 

[sandyf]

3 hours ago, sirineou said:

"The new visa package, which if all goes to plan will be announced in June, "

Well ,let's  see if anything comes out of this. At the very least eliminating the 90 day reporting would be a step in the right direction. 

There are bigger issues to address than something that takes only a few minutes online.

[sirineou]

2 minutes ago, sandyf said:

There are bigger issues to address than something that takes only a few minutes online.

A few minutes on line ? You must be new to Thailand. Anyway why should a long term resident of Thailand have to report every 90 days if he/she reports in when they do their extension to stay every year?  

[PEE TEE]

The Rich don't come to Thailand not to sty its not cool. 

[sirineou]

36 minutes ago, Surasak said:

A good start would be to update their computer systems to something more in line with Windows 10, instead of MS-DOS and so slow, over worked servers.

If they hired professionals to these things instead of their teenage nephew.....  

[bluesea]

Cut all the B.S and open the door to Immigration and start to hand out Citizenship its your only answer as these stories on thaivisa keep going around in circles every month.

[wensiensheng]

1 hour ago, Poet said:

Actually, vaccinated tourists won't care if the local population are vaccinated, and neither will these incoming tourists present any biological threat to the local population.

It would, of course, be good if the local population are vaccinated, but it has no bearing on the recommencement of mass tourism. The key factor is that all the incoming tourists are verifiably fully-innoculated.

 

With all due respect, I think the opposite is true.

 

if the local population is vaccinated, who cares whether incoming tourists are vaccinated or not?

 

but if the local population isn’t vaccinated then bars and other leisure activities will still be closed and the tourists unlikely to come. There is also the issue of vaccinated tourists still being able to carry the virus and be contagious.

 

the flaw in vaccinating locals and opening for business with no restrictions is that tourists could catch the virus from other tourists, and that being the case, would they come?

 

which goes to show that the only real solution is to vaccinate everybody.

[newnative]

    Another day, another proposal.  Unfortunately, nothing ever gets past the proposal stage. Talk, talk, talk.  No action.

[wensiensheng]

3 minutes ago, bluesea said:

Cut all the B.S and open the door to Immigration and start to hand out Citizenship its your only answer as these stories on thaivisa keep going around in circles every month.

But who wants to be a thai citizen? Most just want to live here

[Misterwhisper]

"Thailand lures the rich..."

 

I don't know, whenever I read "Thailand" and "lure" in the same sentence I get the rather uneasy feeling that somebody, somewhere is going to get squeezed for every penny they're worth -- receiving very little in return. 

[Thorix]

Quote

the Finance Ministry now predicts the economy will grow just 2.3% in 2021, with tourism revenue expected to reach a mere 170 billion baht.

1 - The Financy Minsitry predicted the economy sinking -6.x% a few days ago.

2- I doubt Thailand will reach "a mere" 170 billion baht with the big cut on foreign capital moving around, unless we are now cooking the books and all expats and their expenses now magically become income from tourism, in addition to the money spent of Thai national holiday makers. Yes, those ones in saving mode due to the economic hardship.

---????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????------

[herwin1234]

2 hours ago, mikebell said:

You forgot dogs and crooked police, both hunting in packs; house-owning scams; predatory females; over-abundance of inept lawyers; lazy work force; injustice.

amazing. adult people move out of free will  from their own country to another country THAT THEY OBVIOUSLY HATE, and DECIDE TO LIVE HERE FOR YEARS AND YEARS in the country they deeply despise. 

 

"predatory females",  lmao. and adult guy whining about women who outsmart him. you cant make this <deleted> up

[Miss Pickle]

This Covid outbreak is a huge set back for Thailand until they get the vaccine out to the people nobody will be coming here. I arrived in March from the UK I can hardly believe how bad it has effected everything the Islands Samui Phuket Pattaya and the rest will take. Years to recover from this sadly.I feel so sorry for the poor working Thais.

[Ventenio]

Red Flag.  Everyone is here because they know it....

 

If you are struggling with 800k, you know there is a chance it might go to 8 million.  not unreasonable.  400k to 4  million.  possible.  

 

if you are "poor," you are going to get squeezed.  When a country makes it clear that money is EVERYTHING.....you have your answer.

 

Rich, line 1.   The rest, sorry closed.  

 

Sad thing is there are now "Jade billionaires" in Myramar who will be more welcomed than the poor falang.  

 

don't worry, we have a few more years...

[thaigrifter]

3 hours ago, Skeptic7 said:

Lure them with what??? 

Schemes, scams, stupidity and snarls? Lies, greed, baditude and bigotry? Duel pricing, flaming hoop jumping policies, inept government, unfounded superior attitude, most dangerous roads and 3rd World ways? 

 

Good luck with all that. Already dumped all over the loyal ones of us who've been here for years/decades. Nobody is coming and it couldn't happen to a more deserving place. 

Well if I hated the place as much as you seem to, I'd be out of here, I wouldn't live in a country that makes me so miserable.

[IamNoone88]

There's a deafening silence from the "big it up" Phuket Hotel Association these past couple of weeks as the open at all costs sandbox Phuket dream evaporates. Ironic that the very same "return to normal and open up asap' was shattered by exactly that - large crowds visiting and partying as normal. Now look at the billions Phuket is losing again as ALL bars, restaurants, gyms and shops are closed or are again controlled. Airlines and ..... hotels are whacked even harder. Be careful what you wish for. Nowhere is safe, until everywhere is safe.

[SymS]

Another one of this type of "announcement" without concrete proposals. They have to stop "mulling", and get on with business.

[whaleboneman]

“The government has requested the guillotine but we know that it is not easy,”

 

Sure it is - line em up and I'll pull the release lanyard.

[Jiggo]

Please, Please no more of this Tourism Talk, I can't take no more.

[Brickbat]

3 hours ago, Damrongsak said:

So, getting in, what, 30 million cheap Chinese visitors didn't work.  So go after the rich foreigners.  Only problem is they need to clean up after all those other people.  It's a sad state of affairs. 

Aren’t you Damn Wrong, buddy. Chinese are also “ foreigners” 

you have the right name! 
in answer to this post, I don’t see rich people being stupid, or lining up like cheap felons to report every 3 months. The world has much better places for the rich 

[LivinLOS]

The offer this time is a 'free 'elite' limited edition keyring' !!! 

 

Only need to invest 50 million baht in a Thai account that can not be accessed for 3 years.. Or ever taken out the country.. Plus 3 special rounds of golf at only 10k per round discount, and a spa.. 

 

Good deal na ??  

[Jimbo2014]

A few things they may want to do to attract this affluent group of people.  A) clean up the air, burning season is ridiculous and 'high net worth people' sometimes like to breath. B) Clean up the roads.  High net worth people dont like to have their Rich A@@ smeared across the road.  C) Clean up tourist locations, many look like post apocalyptic wastelands.

[huangnon]

Expect a "Hiso variant" of Covid-19, as wave #134 sweeps the country, blah blah. ????