Freelance Web Design?

[HalfSquat]

Hi all.

I am in the UK and am currently working full-time in IT and outside of work hours I also do freelance webdesign for individuals and small local businesses.

I am thinking of comming to Thailand in about 8 months with my girlfriend who will be teaching.

Do you think it would be possible for me to work freelance as a web designer in the same way I am doing in UK (i.e. small time local projects) and if so what kind of work permit would I need?

I speak no Thai.

Thanks for you help.

[wxpwzrd]

Hi all.

I am in the UK and am currently working full-time in IT and outside of work hours I also do freelance webdesign for individuals and small local businesses.

I am thinking of comming to Thailand in about 8 months with my girlfriend who will be teaching.

Do you think it would be possible for me to work freelance as a web designer in the same way I am doing in UK (i.e. small time local projects) and if so what kind of work permit would I need?

I speak no Thai.

Thanks for you help.

Well, I might guess on this. I am also an IT technologist and do web design/development for US clients because I can speak English and because I understand a client's needs. I imagine you have this same ability in the UK.

Here, you speak no Thai, and even more important, likely cannot read it. You are in a country with a predominately Thai audience and even if there was a need for sites in English, chances are they are also needed in Thai.

And, maybe most important, you need to answer the question regarding whether or not to do the work at drastically reduced charges.

[webfact]

Well, as the OP poster mentions, to be prepared to receive lowest payment, even from foreign companies based in Thailand. He is right.

Forget everything about fees you receive or ask for in the UK, Canada, USA, Europe... when it comes to Thailand.

You won't even imagine how low it is. Here customers expect "top work - of course, but are only willing (with some exceptions) to pay you lowest fees.

To be frank, your chances to get jobs from here are almost nil, as long as you are not based in Thailand.

Give it a try, but I have my doubts about you succeed. I do not want to disappoint you but here in Thailand you have thousands of competitors.

cheers

[Crushdepth]

Maybe worth playing to your strengths and focussing on 'farang' clients. There's a fair number of people here that find it difficult to deal with local designers because of language / culture / attention to detail issues. But making money in web design is a hard slog even under the best of conditions. The local talent is very good when it comes to artwork (if not security) and yes they are cheap.

Don't kill me for suggesting this...ever thought about teaching web design?

Edited February 5, 2009 by Crushdepth

[wxpwzrd]

Maybe worth playing to your strengths and focussing on 'farang' clients. There's a fair number of people here that find it difficult to deal with local designers because of language / culture / attention to detail issues. But making money in web design is a hard slog even under the best of conditions. The local talent is very good when it comes to artwork (if not security) and yes they are cheap.

Don't kill me for suggesting this...ever thought about teaching web design?

No intention of questioning your comments other than for personal knowledge. Can you actually point me to any sites that show the quality of work by 'local talent?' Honestly, I have not researched Thai sites, since I can't read them anyway; but I would be interested in seeing sites that reflect real quality of work here. The few that I have seen are horrible for many various reasons.

[Gregory Morozov]

Please give us a link to your portfolio and maybe we can talk. We have farang customers who want top notch websites and are ready to pay; not UK rates but way above Thai rates.

[Cuban]

There are a number of people 'living' in Thailand doing this sort of business already. So it can be done. If you are marketing your services toward Englisg speaking people locally then your income will be small. Better to continue dealing internationally.

I will assume by your Newbie status that you are at the early stages of planning this move, so before downloading Thai Fonts and wavy Gifs of Thai flags I strongly suggest that you research "Work Permit" either inthe business & jobs section of this forum or many others that cover this topic.

Although some people 'work' in Thailand without such a work permit if you are caught penalties can be high.

Even if you are not un/offically working, spending 8 months in Thailand will require more then a 30 day stamp in your passport on arrival. You will need to look at your visa status. If your GF is teaching - she might/must have researched her Work Permit and Business Visa?

HTH

[Phil Conners]

Hi all.

I am in the UK and am currently working full-time in IT and outside of work hours I also do freelance webdesign for individuals and small local businesses.

I am thinking of comming to Thailand in about 8 months with my girlfriend who will be teaching.

Do you think it would be possible for me to work freelance as a web designer in the same way I am doing in UK (i.e. small time local projects) and if so what kind of work permit would I need?

I speak no Thai.

Thanks for you help.

There is only one kind of work permit and to get it you won't be able to work as a freelancer. You need several things including:

1) a dedicated office address.

2) a Thai company with min 2M baht capital.

3) min. 4 Thai employees.

4) min. taxable personal income of 60,000 baht/month.

That's just for starters, there are lots of other little gotcha's. Unless you want to break the law of course, but I don't think that would be a good idea. I understand the penalty for working without a work permit in Thailand are very dire and generally ends with deportation.

Besides there are already plenty of established web design companies in Thailand.

Edited February 6, 2009 by Phil Conners

[Gerry290]

What about "Working Virtually Remote Teleworking" so to speak!

Make the Globe Your Market Place!

I hope this post, gives you reasons, HOW YOU CAN do this, as opposed to me giving

a list of negative reasons. to "forget it"... remember "Where there is a Will There is A Way!"

Look for ways HOW TO do it... How can you make this work?

You could be living in Thailand, living a low cost life style in nice weather.

(assuming you will not waste your time in gogo bars & associated BS).

Living Low Cost, you could do a "Ryan Air" & pass on this cost saving to clients, contacts,

& prospects, back in the UK & indeed other companies, by offering the highest quality work

at the best price in town.

Undercut your local competition back in what ever part/city of UK you are in.

Explain, HOW you can offer the best quality at the best price, most prospects will not

give a dam_n your working from an "off shore location in our BKK Office"! if you do

a great job at a great price, & you as a Webbie know already, everything in business

(90%) of it , (except a physical hand shake) can be done Online. Virtual Meetings,

Dial ins etc.

Use your SEO skills to market yourself online, to your home country or international,

perhaps, focus on creating Web Sites for a particular niche or sector. Do all the Internet Marketing

strategies, Viral Marketing, Article Writing, Blogging. to promote yourself, as the

"Web Man! Best Price! Best Site! No Bullshite!"

If you look at being in Thailand, this way, working back into Europe, High Quality Work at the

Best Price... ( and NO... Pay Peanuts Get Monkeys does not apply if you explain, in as part of your

USP.... WHY you offer the Best Lowest Price at Highest Quality).

Then your not caught in the loop of doing 3 page sites, for shady farangs will not pay the 3,000 B fee for

a brochure site for their beer bar. (Most people are Ok, there is a few shady ones about).

Anytime, I hired Indians off Elance.com for not only webwork but other back office work, BPO etc. everysingle

time, the energy I had to put in, to correct gormless mistakes, or endure pushy attitudes of services, I did not

want. etc.... pain in neck. As for Thai Web Companies, Several just in Pattaya alone, I emailed several times,

re little projects I wanted done, not one ever emailed back, not even a confirmation email! So if a Web company

does not answer email... & them in the online internet business... I went back to godaddy.com

I think, just to give you some encouragement, on a basic level. Instead of focusing on Web Design in Thailand,

why not, focus on using the LOW COST Business environment, to pass the Cost Savings on to UK, or other International

prospects, in the form of very reasonable low low fees for high service. (Use all the Marketing Techniques in the Book, Cold Calling Is A Waste of Time by Frank Rumblaskus. on how to market your service. & Web 2.0 maketing etc etc._/

With the Recession, & companies in general more Web Marketing Aware, you could push the low cost ways to market their traditional offline business, get more customers, re low cost online methods. (ethical), & you set up the web sites, free viral e-reports, aweber newsletter, blog, mini sites, so your doing more than just a Website, offer the Site & all the online low cost to free marketing methods available.

Set yourself up as a Low Cost High Quality Full 100% Refund if not happy, Increase Business in Recession Via online methods + Website..... use the low cost of living in Thailand, give mega low fees. Find out your local UK location web companies, customers & gentle approach them with your low cost solution. Better still, if your only planning on coming here for a year so, you could even set yourself up as a total separate "sister company offshore" to your UK web persona, so when you go back home, your not stuck on the low fee model.

You could even work down into Australia which is 3 hours ahead of Thailand. USA etc. And another

smaller advantage, if you explain about you working from your SE Asian branch office, your not under the expense

of having to year $1000 Suits with new clean BMW to impress corporate clients back in the UK. BUT you keep a really sharp online image via your own web online marketing, use a 24 x 7 answering service etc.

READ: 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. its all about this. excellent book.

Yes, I know, Teleworking Virtually as such is actually a "Job Title" so you still need your Thai company set up, & work permit etc, to Telework Virtually like this from Thailand. I sey myself up properly like this pay tax here etc, as I did all I advised you above working my IT Recruitment Dublin based company. In fact 99% of companies or candidates, I never once mentioned I was out side of Ireland as these days. seems most IT Managers etc are too busy for face to face meetings. So I did all work on Phone (VOIP, Skype etc) & Email.

Another benefit, well as per Ireland in EU, as I kept an Irish Ltd co too, was except for VAT on sales invoices in Ireland I was tax free as per Ireland.

I have parked up this biz now until recession goes in a few years.

Used to be very amusing, recruiting Senior IT Security Manager for large German global Insurance Company, working the process through the interviews, etc, & updating the female HR Director & Snr IT Manager, while sitting on other side of world in Pattaya, with VOIP headphones in, in my underwear! LOL! I placed the job too! :-)

No reason why you, cannot look the this, as per the business model I did, consider yourself an "Off Shore" Provider to EU or UK etc. It takes a bit of balls, & I sure had knock backs re bad internet crashing business for 1 month once & similar. But you can work around these things, with a bit of out of box thinking.

You do have to really push yourself, on marketing yourself, as somedays you can feel very isolate & removed from what is happening on the ground in your UK city or Dublin. But a quick blast of Think & Grow Rich & an daily scan of the Business Pages of Irish newspapers online etc.... its really no different that when I was sitting in my old office in Pearse Street in Dublin. except running cost were about Euro 10,000 less a month!

As I said. I set myself up fully to the letter of the law, with a Thai company & work permit for all that. As I believe in doing things right.

I am sure there is plenty of farangs, doing the same, who work from home kitchen table on PC, teleworking international, keep it quiet. If others do this, well "up to them" but its not my own preference nor advice.

I met PC Support guys from UK, quitely working Remote Dialling in to their customers back in the UK, who live here & one guy, would not take on any local work at all, told me was not worth it & he was best focusing on doing Tech Support back to his UK client base.

I even, on occasion use a Dublin IT Support Small Micropartner PC Support co, to dial in to me over here in Thailand, if I have a serious IT issue, as the 2 directors, looked after me IT set up since 2000, & saves me teeth pulling task of trying to explain my set up to a local to skimp on expense. I find esp with Data loss potential better pay the extra eur0 & get the Dublin lads to dial in to me over there. if a specific database related job is needed. etc...

I think, with some imagination, re this offshore idea. you could so enough business to pay the bills if your only coming for 8 months.

Remember.... focus on HOW TO DO IT.... where there is a will, there is a way!! never forget that. ;-)

[danw]

Using Skype In, a decent portfolio, and a pro-active approach to sourcing work via freelance websites it's entirely possible to fill your days with UK/Western based work at normal UK/Western rates.

From my experience, so long as you have a good portfolio and are a good communicator, it's rare for clients to ask where you are based - a UK Skype In number probably helps here, they assume you're UK based! I'm not suggesting you lie here, if they ask where you are - the professional thing to do is be honest. At some point your location will naturally come up for discussion (like when a client wants to meet for a beer to celebrate a successfuly completed project) - so long as you've done a great and professional job, you'll probably find that disclosing your location at this stage causes no issues at all - you've proved your worth.

It will be harder for you as a designer rather than developer, as the role often requires client liason from a design stage. Developing is easier in that respect, I deal direct with agencies and rarely have need for direct client interaction at all.

Also, be prepared for a few inconvenient hours, the UK is 6 or 7 hours behind Thailand dependant on the time of year, and you will have to be available late into the night as pojects near completion (it's a small price to pay)

You will need to find some way to get a work permit, which will require some creative thinking and / or contacts. Remember you have a service to exchange with business owners here who could help you in this respect.

In terms of local business - there are a wealth of businesses in Thailand that want web design / dev services, I get approached very often! However UK rates can't really be applied - offer a discount but don't go to low, you want to keep enough availability for the lucrative UK contracts! A sensible approach would be to use Thai business as your bread and butter money, and use UK/Western work for fun :-)

Personally I charge full UK rates, a the high end of the spectrum - I do have a very good portfolio to back this up, along with over 10 years commercial experience.

Anyway - OP - please PM me some links to your work, I'm interested to see and may be able to pass some work on ;-)

[wxpwzrd]

To comment on any 'negative posts' - he orginally indicated (or his post appeared to imply) he wanted to do work for local business in Thailand. The remote issues for web design with other countries are a no brainer, except for the legality of doing such work in Thailand.

[HalfSquat]

Thanks for all the replies.

Some of the them are very interesting.

I guess it all comes down to getting clients (whether in the UK or locally in Thailand) and having a permit to do the work.

I don't even know how much a loaf of bread costs in Thailand so have lots of research to do as to what amount of work I would have to do etc.

I could do my current day job remotely - it would be amazing if they let me do that from Thailand but I highly doubut it!

[danw]

I could do my current day job remotely - it would be amazing if they let me do that from Thailand but I highly doubut it!

That's what I did for the first year I left England - it took 18 months to talk my employers into it - get them to give you a chance working from home for a month or 2 in the UK, try to avoid going into the office, and to perform all duties by email and Skype. If that goes smoothly (make sure it does) it should be simple to join the dots together for your employers and make the transition from remote working within the UK to remote working from abroad.

Edited February 16, 2009 by danw

[girlx]

From my experience, so long as you have a good portfolio and are a good communicator, it's rare for clients to ask where you are based - a UK Skype In number probably helps here, they assume you're UK based! I'm not suggesting you lie here, if they ask where you are - the professional thing to do is be honest. At some point your location will naturally come up for discussion (like when a client wants to meet for a beer to celebrate a successfuly completed project) - so long as you've done a great and professional job, you'll probably find that disclosing your location at this stage causes no issues at all - you've proved your worth.

hm i have never tried it that way, i tell them up front i am located in thailand. but i also charge less from here as an incentive. i might go for a few projects at my normal rate and see if i can manage to get around the location issue (which really, for most projects, should not be an issue whatsoever).

[Cuban]

> I don't even know how much a loaf of bread costs in Thailand

35 Baht pre-sliced wrapped in a plastic bag.

185 Baht handmade by European bakers locally.

As for the price of eggs.....

[Valjean]

It's not a local company and I won't comment on the legal or visa issues but the sites like guru. com and elance. com are designed to connect freelancers with projects.

[girlx]

i have used elance a bit but the people who post projects on there are such cheapskates! i wouldn't plan on getting the bulk of your work from there. rather, set up a nice portfolio site and email companies on craigslist and the like with a nice, personalized proposal.

[mochicci]

i'm looking for a freelance wesbite designer. contract for 2-3 months. Chiang mai. we should talk.

[scifi]

One thing I know: you can set up a Thai company, get a work work permit and work solo. You only need 4 Thai employees for each additional foreigner you want to employ. You will need an office, and you will need to submit accounts/pay tax, and it takes a fair bit of investment, although the capitalisation does not need to be all "paid up".

One thing I have heard from my accountant: if you do work on publicly accessible web sites for clients outside Thailand (I know that is not the OP's intention), then you cannot invoice 0% VAT for export. You will have to charge/pay the 7% VAT rate because "the web site can be accessed in Thailand". Interesting one, that.

[Phil Conners]

Not true. You need Thai 4 staff to get the first work permit. It used to be possible without up to about a year ago, then they got tough on it.

Edited April 2, 2009 by Phil Conners

[scifi]

Thanks Phil ^ I stand corrected. Crikey. That really was the end for new freelancers here - legally, at least. I am starting to remember now... didn't the capitalisation go up too?

[ernest1966]

If you do end up working here. Do it legally. Back when I was living in Turkey, many of the english ex-pat community thought they could work without a permit.

All it took was a jelous turkish guy to grass them to the police and before they knew it they where at the airport being deported with a three year enntry ban plus a 1400 YTL (bout 5K sterling) fine.

And this isn't a comment to try and discourage, best of luck.

Ernest

[Phil Conners]

Thanks Phil ^ I stand corrected. Crikey. That really was the end for new freelancers here - legally, at least. I am starting to remember now... didn't the capitalisation go up too?

I think the cap is the same, 2M baht, doesn't need to be paid up (1M if you're married to a Thai).

[thaibkk]

you need to do it legal, but frankly, what do you get in return except losing all your money?

it always makes me laugh? my home country : as foreigner, you can get social security, without having to work one day, you get social housing at the expense of the local people ending paying for you, you get free doctor bills paid by social institutions.... all that for illegal people in my country

here you have to cough up 2 million baht, need to take 4 lazy thai workers even you are freelancer, you need to have 60k baht taxable income, etc...

for getting nothing in return except the privilege to spend all your money here

no free nothing in the land of LOL

[potters]

Hi all.

I am in the UK and am currently working full-time in IT and outside of work hours I also do freelance webdesign for individuals and small local businesses.

I am thinking of comming to Thailand in about 8 months with my girlfriend who will be teaching.

Do you think it would be possible for me to work freelance as a web designer in the same way I am doing in UK (i.e. small time local projects) and if so what kind of work permit would I need?

I speak no Thai.

Thanks for you help.

PLEASE CONTACT AS I MAY BE INTERESTED IN USING YOUR SERVICES.

REGARDS

HARRY

[Flow]

Hi all.

I am in the UK and am currently working full-time in IT and outside of work hours I also do freelance webdesign for individuals and small local businesses.

I am thinking of comming to Thailand in about 8 months with my girlfriend who will be teaching.

Do you think it would be possible for me to work freelance as a web designer in the same way I am doing in UK (i.e. small time local projects) and if so what kind of work permit would I need?

I speak no Thai.

Thanks for you help.

A comparison:

Asked a farang guy to redo me 20 pages to an existing webiste. He wanted 50,000 Baht for only 5 pages. And not only that, he was not willing to offload old pages and upload new pages onto the server nor was he ready to put the old content back in. He wanted for 5 pages 50K!

I approached a very big Web Design company in Bangkok. With a very impressive portofolio and I'm talking big name companies e.g. Nissan, Tata Motors, PB to name a few. They wanted 42,000 Baht for 20 pages. Thrown in a couple of freebies / extra things on top. Willing to offload and upload pages as desired by the customer (me) etc.

Dropped the one man show farang guy and chose the latter and I think any businessman would have done the same.

Thai web companies charge a fraction of what farang web designers charge in Bangkok. The reason most foreign run web dompanies go bust before even starting. And yes, it can be painful dealing with Thais but... business is business at the end of the day.

Having said this, I would hire you if you're willing to work for me at a rate of 500 Baht an hour.

[sunray69]

One thing I have heard from my accountant: if you do work on publicly accessible web sites for clients outside Thailand (I know that is not the OP's intention), then you cannot invoice 0% VAT for export. You will have to charge/pay the 7% VAT rate because "the web site can be accessed in Thailand". Interesting one, that.

Not true. I have an LTD here which develops software (ecommerce mainly) for my EU company and it surely does not matter if the website on which you work is accessible from Thailand or not. Well anyway all websites are accessible from Thailand as well. What matters is the location of your customer, in my case Greece so I invoice my own greek company with a 0% VAT rate.