TAT boss: quarantine remains for 1 day to test all visitors, no going back to old tourism pub scenes

[sirineou]

11 minutes ago, Almer said:

All this tbc ????

Absolutely right. All this is politicians talking, let's wait and see. 

IMO though, the test upon departure, then test again on arrival, is not a bad idea, What else can they do? Have people come here untested? And it's not a one day quarantine, It is a way to get the test results back. If this thing is even mildly successful,  there would be thousands of tests, no way those can be done and returned in less than 24 hrs. Rabid tests are unreliable with too much false negatives and positives. Other countries had such a system with good successes.

The covid insurance is idiotic IMO, I read the Covid results every day and it seems that There are an average of 10,000 cases per day and only a couple of doen are from outside the country, if that's the case it would be cheaper IMO for thailand to absorb that cost , than to lose tourists because of it. Someone needs to do a cost/benefit analysis on the covid insurance issue.  

[Eric Loh]

2 minutes ago, GeorgeCross said:

if they really want rid of the bar scene then go after the supply.. it could be done today, with the stroke of a pen.

 

all bar licenses revoked, no new licenses to be granted.

 

much more efficient than trying to tamp down demand with endless hoops that upsets every tourist who wants to come here.

 

lets see if they have the balls..

 

(they don't)

 

My business friends in Pattaya said that licenses for bars and nightclubs with sex related reputation are not renewed. New licenses are halted. Seem like they are serious at least in Pattaya. 

[aussiexpat]

I explained to my family that the reason I'm retiring to Thailand is that "every night can be like New Years Eve" if you want it and "You can live like a King" on everything being so cheap.

 

Looks like both reasons gone now ????

 

[Sydebolle]

Another clown having his 5 minutes of fame. Higher end tourists demand a higher end product like English spoken (taxi etc.), easy entry regulations, no double standards and a clean trafficless environment.

So better stay with katoeys, hookers, beers etc.; after all all those nighttime workers cannot or do not want to do anything else. Keep cabbies isaanspoken with rigged metres and „hello sexy man“!

[Walker88]

1 minute ago, gk10012001 said:

Isn't it possible that many so called high quality (Thai translation: high spending) tourists that like ladies, or boys, or ladyboys with morally casual attitudes.

True that^

 

I was on the buy side in the financial industry, which means I was regularly courted by all the prime brokers looking for my business. Invariably when they took 'me' out, the real intent was to use the expense account of the firm to hit 'gentlemen's clubs', where they would get thousand dollar lap dances while drinking Cristal or Dom.

 

These were all guys who make 7 figures a year, so in Thai terms represent 'quality'. If working in Tokyo, Hong Kong, or Singapore, Bangkok and Pattaya were the destinations for vacation---and NOT to visit the temples.

[dutchman]

Tourisme without have entertainment will die, 

Unbelievable thinking, time will tell

good morning vietnam and cambodia here we come

 

[ChipButty]

Might as well just ban ALL alcohol sales see how that goes down with Dr Singha and Mr Chang 

[Mr Meeseeks]

6 hours ago, Enzian said:

The puritans in government see the pandemic as a once in a lifetime opportunity to transform their shame about the "lower orders" into an image of glowing virtue. But reality will intervene, as it always eventually does.

Pretty much what I have been saying all along, that this COVID outbreak will be used to rid the country of its sex-tourism and entertainment business and reputation.

 

As you say though, without a plan b, it won't work.

[fondue zoo]

So who actually is in charge here in Thailand?

[smedly]

2 hours ago, hotchilli said:

If they stick to that Thailands dead in the water, that's what 90% of tourists came for.

Pattaya, Bangkoks Red-light areas, Samui, Phuket etc etc... they offer nothing else.

if he is referring to Chinese and Indian tourists, even from the middle east then he is quite correct - they are not interested in the bar/nightclub scene and for them it wouldn't matter if they never opened again 

 

but they need to be prepeared to cut loose tourists from Europe Russia Austrailia USA etc because they are never coming to Thailand without the nightlife 

[Mr Dome]

Hope nobody was fooled for a minute that things would return to pre-2020? That won't happen for years, perhaps never again our lifetime.

 

I dread to think about what will happen once Covid clusters break out all over the place. It's going to happen, folks. And then, what?

 

 

[ChipButty]

9 minutes ago, fondue zoo said:

So who actually is in charge here in Thailand?

Anybodies guess 

[Bangkok Barry]

5 hours ago, ukrules said:

He just announced the death of Tourism in Thailand. It's over.

 

He's far too dumb to realise it just yet but that realisation will come, probably some time in January 2022 once everyone who's conned into coming here realises that it's one of the worst places to go for their winter trip.

 

RIP, final nail, etc, etc.

I don't think he's dumb. He just knows that he can't say that the only way to re-ignite the visitor numbers is to allow the nightlife to flourish, along with the 'side' employment that comes with it, when his employer, the government, is hell-bent on preventing it.

[sambum]

All efforts to woo the tourists back have failed, so now they say they didn't want them anyway because they are aiming for a "better class of people"?.

 

 

[Guderian]

They should save money on their advertising campaign and only target teetotallers, hermits and sociophobes.   :rolleyes:

 

Maybe a few new campaign slogans are in order:

 

Thailand: come for the sun, die of the tedium.

or

Thailand: the hub of beaches and boredom.

[Molly Malone]

48 minutes ago, Zikomat said:

 Even at the best of times their lunatic ideas of turning places like Pattaya into the family friendly resort have failed inevitably. To try and to pull the same stunt at the time of the biggest crisis in the history of the world tourism… send a psychiatrist to the TAT premises.

Exactly right! A small group of these ELITES in suits with millions in their pockets (somehow), love to go the holy'er than thou route of "we want only puritanical visitors, NO SEX allowed" let us do all the smiling while we take your money, but you DO NOT GET TO PARTY here!

 

You can't fix STUPID with some diplomats!

[hotchilli]

10 minutes ago, smedly said:

if he is referring to Chinese and Indian tourists, even from the middle east then he is quite correct - they are not interested in the bar/nightclub scene and for them it wouldn't matter if they never opened again 

 

but they need to be prepeared to cut loose tourists from Europe Russia Austrailia USA etc because they are never coming to Thailand without the nightlife 

The entertainment establishment owners will be baying for his blood, not to mention the thousands of workers who will have to go freelance.

[Bkktodd]

6 hours ago, fusion58 said:

Great! I’m currently waiting for approval on my COE application. Flight arrives on November 12. Did I just waste several days of my time?

It seems  yes.  I got a COE today for 23oct.  If i were coming in mid November i would have waited.  Things change by the day….er hour

[chilli42]

6 hours ago, webfact said:

TAT boss rules out going back to the old Thai tourism formula of crowded bars and nightlife. He insists the kingdom is instead pursuing a higher quality, more family-friendly market.

Well, there is nothing wrong with the goal.  The real problem is that they intend to do nothing different than they have been to attract said tourists (other than build a few soulless walking streets) but expect that a new kind of tourist is going to show up … by decree I guess. 

[overherebc]

34 minutes ago, Sydebolle said:

Another clown having his 5 minutes of fame. Higher end tourists demand a higher end product like English spoken (taxi etc.), easy entry regulations, no double standards and a clean trafficless environment.

So better stay with katoeys, hookers, beers etc.; after all all those nighttime workers cannot or do not want to do anything else. Keep cabbies isaanspoken with rigged metres and „hello sexy man“!

Tourist.  Do you have a wine you could suggest to go with the meal?

Waiter/Waitress.

The red one sir.

[wombat]

''no going back to old tourism pub scenes''

Thats you out of job soon....

 

[Walker88]

6 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

The entertainment establishment owners will be baying for his blood, not to mention the thousands of workers who will have to go freelance.

It's not just the women who dance in the agogos.

 

There are bartenders, wait staff, security, beer companies, beer delivery guys...plus all the ancillary businesses that feed the punters before they hit the bars, taxi drivers who shuttle punters to and from the venues......can a 'family friendly' economy find alternate employment for all those folks?

 

Thailand's low UE pre-Covid was masked by the fact the nightlife industry employed so many people, not to mention the economic boost from all the remittances sent back to the provinces.

 

Now I wonder if this puritan ethic will also apply to all the Thong Lo and Ekamai clubs that cater to Thai govt officials and senior military types?

 

[rupert the bear]

more of this never ending self delusional claptrap.they fool no one except themselves.thailands trashed its environment and prices are high most places,the ripoffs the racial profiling re prices.people are wise to it.whats thailand known for ....well let me tell you....hookers corruption drugs and ripoffs.its something of a daily mail perspective but.....people have other options,cheaper closer to home and where theyre treated with some respect.presently north europeans can visit greece spain croatia portugal etc.further afield lies the gulf and caribbean so........if you can eat and drink freely or socialise till the wee hrs with a drink.sayanora

[rovinman]

The easiest way to close Thailsnd down would be to declare "Prohibition in the country' !

They could clear the country at a stroke  !

[Bangkok Barry]

2 hours ago, bkk6060 said:

Some interesting comments about the bars.  Jeez, I would think people would be happy or not care.

I would say 95% of the previous posts/comments on this forum over the years regarding bars has been negative.

Unattractive overweight girls

Expensive drinks

Warm beer

Expensive BF

Girl no good when I took her out

Rude pushy staff

Loud customers

They cheated me on the bill

 

Rarely if ever have read about people being happy with their bar experience.

 

 

And that is exactly why that scene has been losing customers since well before the pandemic. The draconian restrictions placed on the entertainment business since are merely the nails in the coffin. I suppose it's possible that, deprived of customers now, those in the entertainment business might have re-thought their attitude (although, being Thailand, I doubt that) when things re-opened, but the government's determined policy of closing down the industry has probably killed off even that glimmer of hope.

[kcpattaya]

Dear fellow Thailand residents:
Please close all windows and lock all doors!
TAT is talking again!

 

[Bernietravelling]

Well, if I translate that to my own wording, what’s encoded behind the smoke screen of a politician‘s wording, that means:

 

1) We decided, to fully concentrate on the Chinese and Indian high volume market and use the time until they open up to prepare for that. 

 

2) Our target group there will be families with kids making 1, maximum 2 week holidays

 

3) Our announced opening for western countries is only intended to dull the Thai „low class“ and keep them quiet 

 

4) We will strive to direct the inflow of tourism money to the investments of us big shots

 

5) To keep the money in our big resorts, we will further „All-Inclusive“-offers with food and (soft) drinks, so that they never go outside the fence. Additional activities will be offered as high price packages, subcontracted at rock bottom prices

 

 

Good luck with that!

 

Seems, they never came outside their Thai HiSo bubble, 

 

and observed the constantly rising group of young Chinese FIT (frequent independent travelers) in Chiangmai … also those are partying and drinking like crazy. *)

He also never observed, what’s pulling young, well earning Indians to Pattaya …

 

 

 

*) forgetting, what was making Chiangmai popular among Chinese - the movie „Lost in Thailand“ aka. a soft version of „Hangover“

 

[Almer]

52 minutes ago, sirineou said:

Absolutely right. All this is politicians talking, let's wait and see. 

IMO though, the test upon departure, then test again on arrival, is not a bad idea, What else can they do? Have people come here untested? And it's not a one day quarantine, It is a way to get the test results back. If this thing is even mildly successful,  there would be thousands of tests, no way those can be done and returned in less than 24 hrs. Rabid tests are unreliable with too much false negatives and positives. Other countries had such a system with good successes.

The covid insurance is idiotic IMO, I read the Covid results every day and it seems that There are an average of 10,000 cases per day and only a couple of doen are from outside the country, if that's the case it would be cheaper IMO for thailand to absorb that cost , than to lose tourists because of it. Someone needs to do a cost/benefit analysis on the covid insurance issue.  

The threat is from within, given a choice of having an evening meal with 10 unknown tourists or 10 unknown Thai’s I would take the former.

[Eric Loh]

Not trying to defend the idiot but no sensible person will think that he is taking aim at an industry that contribute more than USD5.5 billion a year to the overall economy. Something must be lost in translation or misunderstood that he is aiming to deal a body blow to Bangkok's global reputation as a city with a booming nightlife scene. Post covid, there need to be innovations to preserve the nightclub businesses and the policies on attracting higher end and family tourists will close some bars and nightclubs that don't fit that image.    

[Chelseafan]

What is the point of the 1 day quarantine ?