Possible Pay Raise In The Works?

[tigerboy]

Saw this on The Nation website. It may not be much but it is just in time for the 2008 to 2009 contracts that most Governmet Schools and Rajabahts will be issuing very soon. I'll be pressing for it to be included in my contract and thought that I'd pass it along to others so that they might know about it also. Wish me luck and good luck to y'all too.

-G

REMUNERATION

Civil servants get 6% increase

By The Nation

Published on May 14, 2008

Attempt to cover recent rise in the cost of living

The Cabinet yesterday approved a 6-per-cent salary increase for 300,000 junior officials, retroactive to May 1.

"The increase will cover civil servants, soldiers, police officers, teachers and full-time employees," Finance Minister Surapong Suebeonglee said.

The pay increase will cost the government Bt68 million a month, or Bt340 million for all of fiscal 2009.

Civil servants ranked C1 to C5 will enjoy the salary adjustment, with the C1 rate rising from Bt7,700 to Bt8,200 and the C5 rate from Bt11,000 to Bt11,700.

Surapong, who chairs the national salary committee, said that while this would increase money in circulation, the government estimated that the pay rise could cover the higher cost of living particularly for low-level civil servants and full-time employees.

The move follows Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej's policy to help low-income earners cope with rising living expenses, he said.

However, not all civil servants are included this resolution, as the government needs to take into account inflation as well as its revenues, he added.

Higher oil prices have helped push up the cost of living. Last month, the consumer price index hit 6.2 per cent, the highest level in two years. In the first four months, the CPI was up 5.3 per cent from the same period last year.

Energy Minister Poonpirom Liptapanlop also said after the Cabinet meeting that she would discuss with the three power utilities tomorrow the possibility of cutting the fuel adjustment factor for the June-September round.

The three state enterprises have not yet spent more than Bt1 billion of funds allocated for power-plant construction.

[too true]

Saw this on The Nation website. It may not be much but it is just in time for the 2008 to 2009 contracts that most Governmet Schools and Rajabahts will be issuing very soon. I'll be pressing for it to be included in my contract and thought that I'd pass it along to others so that they might know about it also. Wish me luck and good luck to y'all too.

-

The Cabinet yesterday approved a 6-per-cent salary increase for 300,000 junior officials, retroactive to May 1.

"The increase will cover civil servants, soldiers, police officers, teachers and full-time employees," Finance Minister Surapong Suebeonglee said.

The pay increase will cost the government Bt68 million a month, or Bt340 million for all of fiscal 2009.

Civil servants ranked C1 to C5 will enjoy the salary adjustment, with the C1 rate rising from Bt7,700 to Bt8,200 and the C5 rate from Bt11,000 to Bt11,700.

Sooo, which step in the salary scale has your school got you on? Are you C1 or C5? Or something in between?

I could be wrong here, but I wouldn't put all my eggs into this one particular basket if I were you. I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Cheers,

tt

[KhaoNiaw]

I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Correct, I'd say. Surely your contract puts you on more than the C5 rate. Also, I think you'll find that being employed on a one-year contract means that they don't call you a full-time employee anyway.

[culicine]

I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Correct, I'd say. Surely your contract puts you on more than the C5 rate. Also, I think you'll find that being employed on a one-year contract means that they don't call you a full-time employee anyway.

I'm pretty sure this won't apply to foreign government school teachers, as technically you can't work as a civil servant as you are not Thai. This applies to Thai workers on a civil service scale. Good news for me anyway as my wife is a C8 and should get a bit of a salary rise (at least enough to pay for the increase in the price of rice!!

[tigerboy]

I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Correct, I'd say. Surely your contract puts you on more than the C5 rate. Also, I think you'll find that being employed on a one-year contract means that they don't call you a full-time employee anyway.

OK then, just finished discussing this with my boss who had our Thai HR person check with the Uni's finance department. Apparently some change went into effect about October last year whereby the monthly salary paid to foreign teachers increased from 19,020 baht to 19,790 baht. I calculate that

as a 4% increase. Not a whopping 6%, but still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!

Now, I wonder if I can get any of that backpay from October up untill now...

-G

[PeaceBlondie]

I hardly ever met a Thai teacher making less than 22K, so 6% pay raise would be about 1,300 per month or more. Good for them. My buddy in Chiang Rai should see his wife's teacher salary increase about 3,000. Per month.

[jasreeve17]

I hardly ever met a Thai teacher making less than 22K, so 6% pay raise would be about 1,300 per month or more. Good for them. My buddy in Chiang Rai should see his wife's teacher salary increase about 3,000. Per month.

? You must be mixing with civil servants (or private sector teachers), PB. The older Thia teachers may be employed as civil servants and get a good salary and good perks. Most Thai (uni) teachers are not and get tiny salaries; 12k for my friend who has a masters degree from chula, and works at a good government uni (higher than a raj). The thai school teachers (8 years to 17 years) are also mostly non civil servants and get tiny salaries stating at 7k (with time this will rise up to 15k+). - I know this because I teach the Bangkok Pathom / matyhom teachers during the summer months, and we chat about salaries.

You know all of this already PB, but all I can say is in my own experience I've only met old Thai teachers, who've been in the job for 30+ years and are civil servants, who earn over 15k (a lot more sometimes).

I've just been paid the payrise metioned by Tigerboy, and it was post-dated too.

[PeaceBlondie]

jasreeve, you are probably correct. All the Thai teachers I have known were government officers, who wore brown uniforms to work one day each week. I understand the Ministry of Education has never hired many teachers who would have been born after (about) 1966. Maybe the newer teachers in the govt. system are paid a pittance, without the benefits and pensions that the older generation are looking forward to. If so, shame on the government.

I guess my comments were to head off the inevitable and irrelevant cries that so many master degree genius teachers in Thailand are on a salary of 3000 per month, whilst the beer drinking, lecherous hod-carriers from Nottingham and pig farmers from Tennessee were making 59,000 for teaching conversational classes in Outer Uttradit. There is no relationship between Thai teachers of English and native speakers of English, salary wise.

Back on topic, I am an old civil servant who never thought I was paid as much as I was worth, and I applaud the Thai government for raising salaries. I am sorry to hear it may not apply to the younger teachers.

[PeaceBlondie]

I believe tigerboy is referring to a uni where you also have a housing allowance of around 7000 baht. Some uni employees teach with a bachelors degree, most with a master's. Most do not need to clock in and out and stay on campus all day. They get lots of holidays.

I applied tonight for a job that pays 28K. My upstairs maid drove the yellow Ferrari into the east swimming pool, the butler ran off with the Bentley Arnage, and I need some cash to put fuel in the Lear Jet.

[Ijustwannateach]

Sorry, guys, we're not going to do the "if you aren't making X amount of money you're a loser, dropout, fake teacher, false westerner, bad person, fake saint, martyr, probable drunk, backpacker" thing on this thread. The OP was a question, which has now had some answers. There are plenty of salary pissing-contest threads in OTHER subforums - besides, I live in a cardboard box because I *like* it.

[mrtoad]

Silly question, aren't a lot of the teachers in Government schools employed through an agency? I'd find it somewhat hard to believe that the agencies would be following these pay rises universally.

[DragonQuest]

Actaully great question, Im sure there's a handful of teachers working for an agency, in this case would they been aloud the 6% increase on their 2nd year at the school?

[otherstuff1957]

The foreign teachers' salaries are almost always from an entirely different budget than the regular teachers, so this raise will not effect them at all. In the past, the government gave schools money to hire foreign teachers, so the schools didn't really have to dip into their pockets at all. In fact, they could often make money! At one point schools were getting up to 60K/month per foreign teacher. They would either hire them directly & pay them 35-40K & pocket the rest, or, if the school director didn't have enough clout to tell the auditor to look the other way, they would pay an agency 60K per month per teacher and the agency would pay the teacher 35K, kick back 10K to the decision maker at the school & pocket the rest.

Now the government has stopped giving schools 'foreign teachers money', so the parents usually pay extra(usually 300 - 600b/semester) to cover the foreigners' salaries.

[tigerboy]

I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Correct, I'd say. Surely your contract puts you on more than the C5 rate. Also, I think you'll find that being employed on a one-year contract means that they don't call you a full-time employee anyway.

OK then, just finished discussing this with my boss who had our Thai HR person check with the Uni's finance department. Apparently some change went into effect about October last year whereby the monthly salary paid to foreign teachers increased from 19,020 baht to 19,790 baht. I calculate that

as a 4% increase. Not a whopping 6%, but still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!

Now, I wonder if I can get any of that backpay from October up untill now...

-G

An update for y'all concerning the backpay. I signed on for another year at the Uni where I've

been these last two years, with the new increased payrate mentioned above.

I got the annual bonus at the old salary rate deposited in my bank acount earlier this month.

Then I noted an unexpected deposit that I was racking my brains to figure out, you know what was

the source of the payment and what work was it "for". Couldn't figure it out, none of my numbers

were adding up to what it should be for. Finally asked about it and it was the new salary plus

the backpay for 9 months, going back to Oct when the pay raise went into effect. Yee-haw!

Happy-happy! :-) :-)

So, hope that this info help out some of you Farlang teachers out there that are working at

Government Uni's thatare paying you some "standard contract rate".

[Ijustwannateach]

Good news! Thanks for keeping us informed!

[mopenyang]

I have a funny feeling you won't be included when the raises become effective, unless you really are making 10,000 baht per month.

Correct, I'd say. Surely your contract puts you on more than the C5 rate. Also, I think you'll find that being employed on a one-year contract means that they don't call you a full-time employee anyway.

OK then, just finished discussing this with my boss who had our Thai HR person check with the Uni's finance department. Apparently some change went into effect about October last year whereby the monthly salary paid to foreign teachers increased from 19,020 baht to 19,790 baht. I calculate that

as a 4% increase. Not a whopping 6%, but still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!

Now, I wonder if I can get any of that backpay from October up untill now...

-G

An update for y'all concerning the backpay. I signed on for another year at the Uni where I've

been these last two years, with the new increased payrate mentioned above.

I got the annual bonus at the old salary rate deposited in my bank acount earlier this month.

Then I noted an unexpected deposit that I was racking my brains to figure out, you know what was

the source of the payment and what work was it "for". Couldn't figure it out, none of my numbers

were adding up to what it should be for. Finally asked about it and it was the new salary plus

the backpay for 9 months, going back to Oct when the pay raise went into effect. Yee-haw!

Happy-happy! :-) :-)

So, hope that this info help out some of you Farlang teachers out there that are working at

Government Uni's thatare paying you some "standard contract rate".

Is an annual bonus specified in your government uni contract? How is it computed? Required or optional?

Also, I've never heard of this increase but I will be checking into it.

Thanks for all the info.

[PeaceBlondie]

I was browsing the first, original posts in this Teaching in Thailand forum, back to 2004. One of the first ten posts talked about pay raises. Hardly any farang get government-mandated pay raises....except university lecturers. We have several of those here. Are you paying for the beers tonight?