Tons Of Farang In Thailand Are In Trouble

[Gary A]

I have no sympathy for deadbeat dads. I didn't like paying what I thought was too much but I wouldn't have even considered running from it.

[mrtoad]

I'd say that most of the opinonos are based on over simplification of the facts. There are many different scenarios that parents find themselves in, and unfortunatley relationships do go wrong.

I think the biggest problem in the UK has been the application or lack off by the CSA depending on circumstances. Very little discretion is ever made and some parents find themselves completly cornered with very little chance of starting a new life after they have earning attatchment orders placed on them. Sadly, the only people that ever benefit from this are the lawyers. In the end, I was able to come to an acceptable arrangement with my ex, without the hinderence of the lawyers.

I have been there and got the t-shirt with a lot of the nonsense, and beleive me the amount of money that I paid out on lawyers could have been easily spent on something more useful, like my kids.

So, before anyone accuses' me of being a deabeat, along with a new car, house and a nice cash settlement that she got initially I do still provide money, clothes, presents etc for my children, but I am also more than wary of some of the ways that laws like these can be applied by government departments and how also often large amounts of child support are squandered by mothers on themselves or freinds rather than the children. If settlements were more realistic and less restrictive then there might not be so many people avoiding paying in the first place.

[ColPyat]

Looks the feminists have gained complete control of the USA government afterall. You hate to see this hit so many guys who ended up in bad marriages and were ruined by their wifes. Its amazing how much power the women have in the USA.

How many farang will have to leave thailand? This could wipe out 50% of the farang expat population.

How does this affect the job market and the real estate market. For investors, how are you planning to take advantage of this?

I resisted, but i'll have to take the bait...

Did i miss something or did this forum transform into a therapy session where men with issues can vent their frustrations about not living in the neolithic age anymore where a wedding meant that a male drags a female off by her hair to the next cave, and the offspring is eaten in times of starvation?

[bendix]

Tons of Farangs?

In working out how many farangs this impacts, don't we first have to work out how many farangs there are in a ton? Based on my (admittedly) cursory field research around lower sukhumvit, I'd say around 2.7.

If that's true, this doesnt really impact too many farangs at all.

[Pink Mist]

Tons of Farangs?

In working out how many farangs this impacts, don't we first have to work out how many farangs there are in a ton? Based on my (admittedly) cursory field research around lower sukhumvit, I'd say around 2.7.

If that's true, this doesnt really impact too many farangs at all.

A ton in cricket terms is 100 runs so

[Neeranam]

How many farang will have to leave thailand? This could wipe out 50% of the farang expat population.

I think many farang could be in trouble, but I am sure it will be nowhere like 50%.

Why wouldn't they just buy a new passport ?

[PeaceBlondie]

How many farang will have to leave thailand? This could wipe out 50% of the farang expat population.

I think many farang could be in trouble, but I am sure it will be nowhere like 50%.

Why wouldn't they just buy a new passport ?

US citizens would identify themselves, to get a new passport, by using their Social Security Number (or other things that refer back to the SSN), and would then get tagged with the debt. Same with IRS back taxes, other debts.

[mark100]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap_travel/passports_child_support

WASHINGTON - The price of a passport: $311,491 in back child support payments for a U.S. businessman now living in China; $46,000 for a musician seeking to perform overseas, and $45,849 for a man planning a Dominican Republic vacation. The new passport requirements that have complicated travel this summer also have uncovered untold numbers of child support scofflaws and forced them to pay millions. The State Department denies passports to noncustodial parents who owe more than $2,500 in child support. Once the parents make good on their debts, they can reapply for passports.

Now that millions of additional travelers need passports to fly back from Mexico, Canada, the Caribbean and South America, collections under the Passport Denial Program are on pace to about double this year, federal officials told The Associated Press.

In all, states have reported collecting at least $22.5 million through the program thus far in 2007. The money is then forwarded to the parent to whom it is owed.

Some people never learn.

A boxer paid $39,000 in back child support to the state of Nevada last year to get a passport, which he lost. This year, his promoter had to loan him $8,930 so he could pay off his new child support debts and get a new passport to fight overseas.

In one case last year, a man got his parents to pay his overdue child support — $50,498 to the state of Illinois.

"For us, it's been amazing to see how people who owe back child support seem to be able to come up with good chunks of money when it involves needing their passport," said Adolfo Capestany, spokesman for the state of Washington's Division of Child Support. "Folks will do anything to get that passport, so it is a good collection tool."

The $22.5 million reported to have been collected through the program this year is a conservative estimate. Some states voluntarily report the payments to the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement, but other states don't.

It took all of 2006 to collect the same amount under the program, which began in 1998.

Also contributing to the increased collections was a drop in the threshold for reporting child support debts to the State Department, from $5,000 to $2,500. As a result, 400,000 more cases were submitted to the department.

The state of Washington obtained $24,000 for Teresa Markley through the program. The money accrued over a couple of decades. She said she could have really used the money in past years, and at one point in the 1990s went on welfare for a few months to make ends meet. While her children are now grown, she said the payment still meant a great deal to her.

"What it means to me now is just to have some validation for the suffering I went through," said Markley, a resident of Tacoma, Wash.

Jeannette Dean of Seattle said she had to tap into her retirement savings and her son's savings bond to help pay for basic necessities after Washington state was unable to help her collect delinquent child support payments.

But this year, she received about $36,000 through the passport program. She said the money will be used to replenish the lost savings.

"It has given back to having a normal life versus struggling to pay dental bills and hospitals bills and things like that," Dean said.

The passport denial program is just one of several tools the government has to collect overdue child support. Overall collections totaled about $24 billion last year.

The largest share by far — $20.1 billion — came from withholding from a worker's paycheck. Unemployment insurance or state and federal income tax refunds can also be seized. States with lotteries also can deduct delinquent payments from winnings. Some states submit the names of those behind on their payments to credit reporting agencies.

Payments generated through the new passport requirements are an important sliver of what states collect each year on behalf of about 17 million children, said Margot Bean, commissioner for the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement.

"We often get payments of over $100,000," Bean said. "For whatever reason, this was the only way we could get the money."

For some families, the payments can mean the difference between having to rely on the government for assistance or not relying on it, Bean said. In cases where families have needed cash assistance through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program, a portion of the payments received through the passport program is used to reimburse the government.

Another jump in collections from the Passport Denial Program can be expected next year or in early 2009. That's when the new passport requirements will likely take effect for land and sea travelers too.

---

Looks the feminists have gained complete control of the USA government afterall. You hate to see this hit so many guys who ended up in bad marriages and were ruined by their wifes. Its amazing how much power the women have in the USA.

How many farang will have to leave thailand? This could wipe out 50% of the farang expat population.

How does this affect the job market and the real estate market. For investors, how are you planning to take advantage of this?

lf they did this in the UK half of the expat community in Pattaya would have to go home!!!!!!!!!!!

[farangsay]

How many farang will have to leave thailand? This could wipe out 50% of the farang expat population.

I think many farang could be in trouble, but I am sure it will be nowhere like 50%.

Why wouldn't they just buy a new passport ?

US citizens would identify themselves, to get a new passport, by using their Social Security Number (or other things that refer back to the SSN), and would then get tagged with the debt. Same with IRS back taxes, other debts.

Is it only me that noticed the fundamental flaw in this post ?

If an American in Thailand needs a new passport , and he is flagged as owing child support , he has to pay up if he wants the passport ?

If he does , problem solved (for 10 years ?).

If he doesn't presumably he won't get a new passport.

The only possible reason for an American to leave Thailand (and scurry back to the land of the free) would be if his passport was about to expire and he thought doing so would evade the reckoning. Would they get him at US immigration ?

I am not concerned about a wholesale exodus of Americans , I just think it unlikely.

[bendix]

Where's my pen? I need to write a letter to that nice Mr Gordon Brown.

[JetsetBkk]

It looks like a TV consensus. The OP has completely lost the plot on this topic.

Bangkok Singapore.

DTFTT.

[khunandy]

There are plenty of deadbeat Mums out there as well who simply dont use the child maintenance on the kids. My daughters went through all sorts of embarressing situations where they they didnt go on school excusions or were wearing old clothing because mum claimed she couldnt afford it. Many times I contacted the CSA and asked if there was some way I could split the maintenance so at least they had some money in their pocket to buy clothing when I wasnt there to do it. I was paying a good chunk of money to her , far more than was left in my pocket and the extra handouts were hurting.

The answer was that I could gift money to the kids but it wouldnt affect the amount set by the CSA to be paid to their mother.

My ex always cried poor but it didnt stop her paying the house off 10 years early and it didnt stop her leading her lifestyle of choice one bit. I loved the day that the maintenance obligation to her was finished, it was only then that I showed my daughters how much I was paying and they couldnt believe it. To this day I support them and help them in many ways and it is a bloody good feeling that it doesnt go through her hands anymore. She acted discracefully and there is nothing a responsible non custodial father can do about it. Now the wheel has turned and the handouts are over, she had to find employment after a 20 year bludge and is finally realising that there is no such thing as a free ride for ever.

As for passport confiscation, a canadian workmate of mine went on his regular offswing back home to canada and has his passport seized for non payment of maintenance. he was assumed guilty and had to prove his innocence, which he did in an emergency court hearing. Not only did he prove his innocence but had his payments reduced and his access increased. The lady judge hauled his ex wife over the coals. Nearly cost him his job though with the delays in returning to work....that would have opened up another can of worms.

[tracer5050]

As a American I suport the US of making people pay for the kids , It not the kid faught that they are here and they need to eat and have clothes. I paid my X more than she asked for to keep my kids fed and clothed .

But I also know of some women who use the money not for the kids , keeping up a bum who will not work and shacking up with her.

There are good and bad mothers and dads ,

But I think the passport reg is there to help the kids as well as the income tax laws to keep the refund for the kids.

Someone has to pay better the father or mother than the tax payers

[ratchabuild]

This is great news

Don't think much of the guys who have abandoned their parental duties to come play in Thailand. Think even less of the ones who are being deadbeats on top of that.

Good on the US for introducing a regulation that makes sense.

Lets hope more countries follow.

Got it in one. Yes looks tough on all those men who abandon their children to poverty so they can go whoring. Just be glad you are not bangkokinsingapore.............makes my flesh creep to think about it. have to lose 90% of brain cells and have a morals bypass operation plus learn to be bilingual in rubbish and crap

[bangkoksingapore]

this is rubbish. havent you read dana on stickman? if a women has a baby with you and wants to use the dumb kid against you then you have no responsbility to play ball. you raise the kid while he lives with a step dad and the step dad tells him that you are a no good loser? id burn their house down before making a payment.

[cdnvic]

I have a solution for those who are complaining about the way the mothers are spending the money. Go home and be there for your children. Take care of them, fight for your share of custody. There are millions of perfectly happy kids that don't live on a lot of money. They don't need money so much as they need their parents. It's inexcusable the amount of "men" who think that by sending money to some woman who is assuming 100% of the parenting responsibilities that they are doing their share of parenting.

As far as I'm concerned if you are on a barstool in Phuket, Pattaya, Korat, or wherever everytime your kid is sick, or comes home with their first date, or scores their first goal, you're just as much a deadbeat as the one who never sends the checks.

[bendix]

As a American I suport the US of making people pay for the kids , It not the kid faught that they are here and they need to eat and have clothes. I paid my X more than she asked for to keep my kids fed and clothed .

But I also know of some women who use the money not for the kids , keeping up a bum who will not work and shacking up with her.

There are good and bad mothers and dads ,

But I think the passport reg is there to help the kids as well as the income tax laws to keep the refund for the kids.

Someone has to pay better the father or mother than the tax payers

I'm curious, tracer. Do you vote?

[cdnvic]

this is rubbish. havent you read dana on stickman? if a women has a baby with you and wants to use the dumb kid against you then you have no responsbility to play ball. you raise the kid while he lives with a step dad and the step dad tells him that you are a no good loser? id burn their house down before making a payment.

Ok, for you I'll make an exception. You should never have anything to do with raising a child. I do give credit however to the wolves who attempted to raise you.

[Jingthing]

I would never have kids, but I hold libertarian views on many issues. For example. prostitution should be legal. Marijuana should be legal. So why do we cheer when our government takes away our right to travel for any reason? Maybe this is a a good enough reason. What's next? The US government holds enough power over Americans, even expats, already. Recently under Bush we rushed like lemmings to relinquish some of our constitutional freedoms in the name of so called security. Stop cheering, its against your overall best interest.

Edited August 22, 2007 by Jingthing

[ratchabuild]

this is rubbish. havent you read dana on stickman? if a women has a baby with you and wants to use the dumb kid against you then you have no responsbility to play ball. you raise the kid while he lives with a step dad and the step dad tells him that you are a no good loser? id burn their house down before making a payment.

You realise that making such a stupid statement if you are identified could lead to you never going on a plane again. Anyone who has made any arson threat on a public forum is likely to be identified as too great a rsik to be carried. Certainly you would'nt be let into the States and thats a fact because I just checked with the Embassy. I suggest you correct your typically dumb and stupid post

[ratchabuild]

this is rubbish. havent you read dana on stickman? if a women has a baby with you and wants to use the dumb kid against you then you have no responsbility to play ball. you raise the kid while he lives with a step dad and the step dad tells him that you are a no good loser? id burn their house down before making a payment.

You realise that making such a stupid statement if you are identified could lead to you never going on a plane again. Anyone who has made any arson threat on a public forum is likely to be identified as too great a rsik to be carried. Certainly you would'nt be let into the States and thats a fact because I just checked with the Embassy. I suggest you correct your typically dumb and stupid post

If anyone wants a laugh then I suggest they read the "Authority" dana on stickman that the OP quotes. I take back any criticism of you bkkinsinga you are the funniest poster I have ever read. I read Dana when he was first posting and anyone who takes that drivel seriously needs to get a reality check and wait until they finish high school before having an opinion on anything except the best new playstation games.

[bendix]

I would never have kids, but I hold libertarian views on many issues. For example. prostitution should be legal. Marijuana should be legal. So why do we cheer when our government takes away our right to travel for any reason? Maybe this is a a good enough reason. What's next? The US government holds enough power over Americans, even expats, already. Recently under Bush we rushed like lemmings to relinquish some of our constitutional freedoms in the name of so called security. Stop cheering, its against your overall best interest.

As a fellow libertarian, i beg to differ. Central to libertarianism is the basic tenet of individual responsibility, including the responsibility to take care of your own.

With rights (to have kids, to travel etc) come responsibilities. If these no-hopers are giving up their responsibilities, withholding the right to travel freely UNTIL they have met those more personal responsibilities seems perfectly reasonable to me. They can have their passports when AND ONLY WHEN, they meet their individual responsibilities.

[JimmyCA]

Although this law doesn't affect me at all, I do know people who have been in arears because of the delays in transfering money etc., especially people who are newly establishing themselves overseas or who work in/near conflict zones and have to rely on the headquarters to make deposits.

If someone wasn't covering for them then what would their kids eat? Should they not have planned ahead for these things? These are kids, not a car payment.

Most of the people who are able to make the hugh support payments, until the kid is out of college in many states, believe the system is grossly unfair to the men. These payments can pile up even when you loose your job.

Overinforcement of an unfair system.

[ColPyat]

I would never have kids,

I had similar thoughts once.

Well, until that little squirt whom nobody wanted, including his birth mother, was left in our house...

He's the joy of our lives now.

[Jingthing]

I am not a pure libertarian, bendix, but I see your point. My main fear is the slippery slope of government having so much power over us.

[mrtoad]

I have a solution for those who are complaining about the way the mothers are spending the money. Go home and be there for your children. Take care of them, fight for your share of custody. There are millions of perfectly happy kids that don't live on a lot of money. They don't need money so much as they need their parents. It's inexcusable the amount of "men" who think that by sending money to some woman who is assuming 100% of the parenting responsibilities that they are doing their share of parenting.

As far as I'm concerned if you are on a barstool in Phuket, Pattaya, Korat, or wherever everytime your kid is sick, or comes home with their first date, or scores their first goal, you're just as much a deadbeat as the one who never sends the checks.

Spoken like a person who has never been in the situation.

Sorry, I just can't agree with what you say at all, but then I'm not going to explain my personal circumstances to you.

[cdnvic]

I have a solution for those who are complaining about the way the mothers are spending the money. Go home and be there for your children. Take care of them, fight for your share of custody. There are millions of perfectly happy kids that don't live on a lot of money. They don't need money so much as they need their parents. It's inexcusable the amount of "men" who think that by sending money to some woman who is assuming 100% of the parenting responsibilities that they are doing their share of parenting.

As far as I'm concerned if you are on a barstool in Phuket, Pattaya, Korat, or wherever everytime your kid is sick, or comes home with their first date, or scores their first goal, you're just as much a deadbeat as the one who never sends the checks.

Spoken like a person who has never been in the situation.

Sorry, I just can't agree with what you say at all, but then I'm not going to explain my personal circumstances to you.

One day maybe you can explain it to your kids.

[Mujjiman]

Why the worry just get a false passpoort, many do ?

[DurianChips]

I would never have kids, but I hold libertarian views on many issues. For example. prostitution should be legal. Marijuana should be legal. So why do we cheer when our government takes away our right to travel for any reason? Maybe this is a a good enough reason. What's next? The US government holds enough power over Americans, even expats, already. Recently under Bush we rushed like lemmings to relinquish some of our constitutional freedoms in the name of so called security. Stop cheering, its against your overall best interest.

The US government isn't interfering with anyone's right to travel here. The US government won't stop you in any way if you attempt to leave the US without a passport. Of course, other countries won't admit you without a US passport, but that isn't the US government interfering, that is foreign countries. A passport is property of the US government (not individual property); it says so right inside of it. Receiving one is a privilege, not a right.

[farangsay]

I would never have kids, but I hold libertarian views on many issues. For example. prostitution should be legal. Marijuana should be legal. So why do we cheer when our government takes away our right to travel for any reason? Maybe this is a a good enough reason. What's next? The US government holds enough power over Americans, even expats, already. Recently under Bush we rushed like lemmings to relinquish some of our constitutional freedoms in the name of so called security. Stop cheering, its against your overall best interest.

The US government isn't interfering with anyone's right to travel here. The US government won't stop you in any way if you attempt to leave the US without a passport. Of course, other countries won't admit you without a US passport, but that isn't the US government interfering, that is foreign countries. A passport is property of the US government (not individual property); it says so right inside of it. Receiving one is a privilege, not a right.

Then why do we all (of whatever nationality) have to pay for them ?

We all need a proof of nationality when we travel outside our native land and it should be a government service to provide that proof.

BTW When is the last time you checked in to an international flight without producing your passport along with your ticket ?

Or have you ever done this?