Police report filed against visa agent - 25 foreigners left without passports

[webfact]

Picture: Daily News

 

An owner of a bedding supplies business in Bang Poo filed a report with the Muang district police in Samut Prakan yesterday against a visa agent, reported Daily News.

 

Phichaphak, 32, and three other people had evidence of cash transfers and Line chat. 

 

A year ago a friend of the business owner recommended  a woman called Patraneekan who she said was a visa agent with police connections who could work on getting visa extensions for 25 of her 40 migrant worker staff.

 

She paid 230,000 baht up front but the visa agent did nothing and then just made excuses about the pandemic and refused to return the money.

 

This had not only caused financial loss but left many of her staff in difficulty without their passports, she said.  

 

Visa-compliant insurance plans that meet the minimum requirement of medical treatment, including COVID-19, up to THB 3m

 

 

-- © Copyright  ASEAN NOW 2021-11-18

 

- Whatever you're going through, the Samaritans are here for you

- Follow ASEAN NOW on LINE for breaking COVID-19 updates

 

Get your business in front of millions of customers who read ASEAN NOW with an interest in Thailand every month - email [email protected] for more information

[Chris.B]

40 migrant workers in a bedding supplies business and Thai people unemployed, the mind boggles! ☹️

[khunPer]

30 minutes ago, Chris.B said:

40 migrant workers in a bedding supplies business and Thai people unemployed, the mind boggles! ☹️

If you read the news you'll know that it's almost impossible to find staff. Some has mentioned that even offering double as high salary normal wage for the job won't help. It might be that Thais considers some work as too low status for them to do - numerous migrant workers left earlier due to the pandemic - I know it as facts from some kind of work, which is often considered too low status for Thais.

[klauskunkel]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

a friend of the business owner recommended

... and "bye, bye" to due diligence

[Tarteso]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Line chat. 

 

 

bussines in LINE CHAT ????

 

[Chris.B]

1 hour ago, khunPer said:

If you read the news you'll know that it's almost impossible to find staff. Some has mentioned that even offering double as high salary normal wage for the job won't help. It might be that Thais considers some work as too low status for them to do - numerous migrant workers left earlier due to the pandemic - I know it as facts from some kind of work, which is often considered too low status for Thais.

I doubt that applies in this case. More likely than not, the owner only wants to pay for cheap labour.

[asiam110]

25 minutes ago, Tarteso said:

 

 

bussines in LINE CHAT ????

 

Just like all the professional thai real estate agents ???? "you have line sir or not"

Edited November 18, 2021 by asiam110

[Ralf001]

2 hours ago, Chris.B said:

40 migrant workers in a bedding supplies business and Thai people unemployed, the mind boggles! ☹️

Thai prefer to bounce on the bed than make them.

[ifmu]

needless to say dont trust others to protect your  ppt money 

[hotchilli]

2 hours ago, khunPer said:

If you read the news you'll know that it's almost impossible to find staff. Some has mentioned that even offering double as high salary normal wage for the job won't help. It might be that Thais considers some work as too low status for them to do - numerous migrant workers left earlier due to the pandemic - I know it as facts from some kind of work, which is often considered too low status for Thais.

Maybe they should change the welfare benefits system of payment.

Link it to the labour department.

If you refuse to work then your benefit is cut.

[trainman34014]

Use an Agent they say; no worries they say, piece of cake they say.    Glad i do everything for myself !

[digger70]

3 hours ago, Chris.B said:

40 migrant workers in a bedding supplies business and Thai people unemployed, the mind boggles! ☹️

Greed ,  Cheap Labour! 

[Jimbo53]

20 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

Maybe they should change the welfare benefits system of payment.

Link it to the labour department.

If you refuse to work then your benefit is cut.

????????????   

What benefits? Its not the UK!!

 

A 60 yr old retired woman in Thailand gets the Princessly sum of 600bht (~£13.65) per month from the Govt to live on,any wonder why the Thai Govt gave no assistance to anyone during the Pandemic!!!

[Nojohndoe]

28 minutes ago, digger70 said:

Greed ,  Cheap Labour! 

Maybe so but it would seem that the Boss was at least trying to provide legal work status.

[Chris.B]

3 minutes ago, Nojohndoe said:

Maybe so but it would seem that the Boss was at least trying to provide legal work status.

Yes, so she could keep her cheap labour!

[Chris.B]

3 minutes ago, Nojohndoe said:

Maybe so but it would seem that the Boss was at least trying to provide legal work status.

Yes, so she could keep her cheap labour!

[Tropicalevo]

4 hours ago, khunPer said:

If you read the news you'll know that it's almost impossible to find staff.

That is certainly true in our case. We have been looking for a couple of guys for pools/gardens/handyman.

Very little interest.

We pay much more than the minimum wage and are struggling to find people.

It will only get much worse when the hotels start to open up again.

We currently only employ Thais, but we are having to rethink that policy. All of our competitors hire Burmese and Thais.

[RJRS1301]

3 hours ago, klauskunkel said:

 due diligence

Please explain ????

[klauskunkel]

12 minutes ago, RJRS1301 said:

Please explain ????

It seems the business owner did not scrutinize this agent thoroughly because of her friends recommendation.

[steven100]

least they won't have to worry about their bed each night .....

[hansnl]

5 hours ago, khunPer said:

If you read the news you'll know that it's almost impossible to find staff. Some has mentioned that even offering double as high salary normal wage for the job won't help. It might be that Thais considers some work as too low status for them to do - numerous migrant workers left earlier due to the pandemic - I know it as facts from some kind of work, which is often considered too low status for Thais.

Really?

Where have I heard this kind of reasoning before?

[Nojohndoe]

1 hour ago, Chris.B said:

Yes, so she could keep her cheap labour!

Again !   Maybe so ...but not potentially even cheaper as illegal workers paid a worse pittance. Or maybe actually a decent Boss who values employees and pays and provides for them for being willing to work? It may be easy to assume the worst of the worst but is it justifiable to take such a view given no premise ?

[josephbloggs]

4 hours ago, asiam110 said:

Just like all the professional thai real estate agents ???? "you have line sir or not"

So what, you only talk about business through letters?  Carrier pigeons?   Semaphore?   You think estate agents in other countries don't use Whatsapp for example?   

What is wrong with liaising with an estate agent over Line?  Or are you another TVF member that is stuck in 1970?

Weird comment.

[soalbundy]

15 minutes ago, Nojohndoe said:

Again !   Maybe so ...but not potentially even cheaper as illegal workers paid a worse pittance. Or maybe actually a decent Boss who values employees and pays and provides for them for being willing to work? It may be easy to assume the worst of the worst but is it justifiable to take such a view given no premise ?

If they were 'legal' they could have gotten their visas themselves surely.

[khunPer]

3 hours ago, hotchilli said:

Maybe they should change the welfare benefits system of payment.

Link it to the labour department.

If you refuse to work then your benefit is cut.

The official unemployment rate - which is probably linked to the welfare system - is low, especially when compared to many other countries, at present it's 1.9 percent; in UK it'f for example 4.5 percent in October and in USA 4.6 percent. In EU the average unemployment rate was 6.7 percent in September.

 

It's often also difficult to get people to change profession, they rather wait if something they are used to work with get available. To my knowledge one the can get 6 month unemployment payout from Social Security in Thailand.

[asiam110]

32 minutes ago, josephbloggs said:

So what, you only talk about business through letters?  Carrier pigeons?   Semaphore?   You think estate agents in other countries don't use Whatsapp for example?   

What is wrong with liaising with an estate agent over Line?  Or are you another TVF member that is stuck in 1970?

Weird comment.

When I enquire about a property listed on DD for example, it would be nice to receive an e-mail with quality pictures, layout, terms of the rents, a little about the agency and their credentials, maybe nicely formatted etc, more often than not you just get some kid that pastes the same pictures from dd often with the watermarks, and a sentence about deposit, then some silly emoji wai. Yes I do expect more professionalism, I'm happy with them to follow up with line and whatsapp to schedule a viewing but it wont be the primary means of exchanging information and developing trust.

Edited November 18, 2021 by asiam110

[zzaa09]

Innocence is as innocence does.....

[Nojohndoe]

20 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

If they were 'legal' they could have gotten their visas themselves surely.

Would you ignore the  number of expats that go the route of using agents ? Are those that do automatically  to be deemed "not so legal" ?

[KhaoYai]

4 hours ago, Chris.B said:

I doubt that applies in this case. More likely than not, the owner only wants to pay for cheap labour.

Whilst I understand your comment, there will no doubt be some unscrupulous types but many business owners the world over, are forced to look for cheap labour in order to compete with Chinese prices.

 

I try to support my  native businesses wherever I can but sometimes its very difficult given the price differences. A few years ago a UK company started up making washing machines, they claim 95% of the parts in their machines are British or EU made and of course, UK companies have to pay at least the minimum wage.  When my washing machine failed I looked into buying one of these British made machines but found that for equivalent models they were around £100 - £150 (45,000 - 67,750 baht) more expensive than most of the usual brands like Bosch.

 

Bosch I might mention who (like many 'Eurpoean brands) trade off their name whilst the majority of their machines or parts are actually made in China. However, when I asked Ebac (the UK company) what the 5% of parts made outside the UK and EU consisted of and where they came from - they told me the motor was made in China ????.

 

(I went for the Bosch but I may be kicking myself soon as I've just noticed that Ebac are now offering a 7 year parts and labour warranty ????)

[Tarteso]

4 hours ago, asiam110 said:

Just like all the professional thai real estate agents ???? "you have line sir or not"

I think you didn’t understand my sarcasm… You assure me that she is a state agent because she uses the line for you to enter money?  Is it an official account ?.  I must be such an idiot to believe what they tell me in a LINE chat?  BTW, I never use an agent, but I use LINE to show transfers to officially recognized companies

 

8 hours ago, webfact said:

  a woman called Patraneekan who she said was a visa agent with police blah blah..using line chat