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Cars Stolen From Thailand On Sale In Laos


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Hi All,

I am doing business in Laos and someone recently told me that a car dealer in Oudomxay Province (northern Laos) is selling good quality pick-ups at cheap prices. They are stolen from Thailand - I would guess the north of Thailand. They come with all the legal documents required in Laos, so obviously some local officials are involved.

Is anyone here in this forum interested to take this up with the Thai police? If so, please send me a PM and I will then try to get the full details of the person selling the stolen pick-ups.

Best regards,

JB.

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Boater is right, but if you must. Any info going to BIB should be anonymous....and don't use your own computer for email or your home or mobile phone cos they may be traced back to you.

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Hi All,

I am doing business in Laos and someone recently told me that a car dealer in Oudomxay Province (northern Laos) is selling good quality pick-ups at cheap prices. They are stolen from Thailand - I would guess the north of Thailand. They come with all the legal documents required in Laos, so obviously some local officials are involved.

Is anyone here in this forum interested to take this up with the Thai police? If so, please send me a PM and I will then try to get the full details of the person selling the stolen pick-ups.

Best regards,

JB.

I love standing up for a good cause, and righting a wrong. BUT, there is a proper time and place to do so. Choose your battles carefully. This is probably not the time, and Laos is DEFINITELY not the place. I personally know of people disappearing after getting involved in the wrong cause in Laos. Better to turn a blind eye to this one I think. A few stolen trucks are not worth what the consequences could be.

Edited by silverhawk_usa
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As tcertain peple may allegedly already be getting their cut, the question will be "why you you think you deserve a cut too?"

...................this could give you some serious problems..........

however if you are determined to get a piece of the action, this is what it seems you do.

hire a car in Bangkok or Pattaya and drive up to Laos border, hang around the sleezier bars etc and make your intentions known - I'm sure someone will offer to take the car off your hands. All you have to do then is tell the company the car has been stolen and pick up your "tea-money".

Personally I think that breaking the law is a seriously bad thing to do - but some people are just plain greedy.

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This has been going on since the beginning of motor vehicles. In Laos easily spotted as the steering wheels are on the wrong side. My old sub contractor back in the early 90's said he bought his Merc from across the Mekhong for 3000B. Used to drive around in it with a heavily armed guard as a driver. A tough sob he was too. I wouldn't have messed with him. Once he recalled a story to me over multiple lao khaos of during the war when he was stuck in the jungle for over 2 months fighting the enemy. They were so horny and without women of comfort that they screwed a horse so hard it couldn't walk afterwards. That was their story and I wasn't going to argue with them.

Edited by Digitalbanana
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They were so horny and without women of comfort that they screwed a horse so hard it couldn't walk afterwards

LMAO

so they chose Beastialty over homosexuality.................

It may really have ben a stallion.

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...and if you are thinking of picking one up cheap and bringing it 'home' to Thailand - a check on the engine/chassis numbers will direct it towards it's rightful owner, you are likely to be at least fined for your misdeed even if you could avoid import tax etc.

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Hi All,

I am doing business in Laos and someone recently told me that a car dealer in Oudomxay Province (northern Laos) is selling good quality pick-ups at cheap prices. They are stolen from Thailand - I would guess the north of Thailand. They come with all the legal documents required in Laos, so obviously some local officials are involved.

Is anyone here in this forum interested to take this up with the Thai police? If so, please send me a PM and I will then try to get the full details of the person selling the stolen pick-ups.

Best regards,

JB.

I have lived in Thailand for a few years and done the border trips many times. One time I went to Poipet, I decided to stay overnight in that dirty, dusty, rundown town, although the Guest House was new, quite stunning inside, and only 350B a night for cable, aircond, and fridge. I like to do photography, and also collect license plates, so spent time looking for things to foto, and plates to collect, not as easy as it seems. Buying whisky for four teenagers I met, at a wedding I got instantly invited to as I was just walking around, one of whom actually spoke reasonable English, and offering some US dollars, they managed to to get me a current car and m/c plate, which I collected the next morning. Walking round, you see many RHD cars, and many with no license plates on them. Some of the RHD cars still have old Thai rego labels on them, so I guess, part of the mafia supplied stolen cars from Thailand. But even some of the Toyotas, that are used as taxis to go to PP, etc are RHD, but have Cambodian plates and Rego stickers, no doubt corruption has been on a grander scale than it is here !!

There are several huge sheds if you walk far enough into and around the town area, full of cars, many RHD, and even m/c's. Apparently these have seized because they are stolen, but many have been there since my first trip back 3 years ago, just more and more each time I go. Perhaps bribery gets them out and sold somewhere, but I remember reading a while ago, (but can't remember the site now) that the mayor/governer of PP, or someone in authority, making a press statemant that all vehicles had to have plates as too many had none, and all vehicles must have the steering on the left, so maybe the RHD market will dry up, and then what will they do?

Well, there's always Myanmar, where R/LHD are common, and I'm sure the brutal dictators and their cronies will snap them up, not giving a hoot where they come from.

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Just about every car in Cambodia has been stolen from Thailand. There's even a special street in PP for selling them.

how you figure? cambodian market for cars have the sterring wheel on the leftside...cambodians stay away from rhd cars like the plague...most hi-end cars in cambodia, you can't even find in thailand, they are mainly american imports....escalades etc...

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As tcertain peple may allegedly already be getting their cut, the question will be "why you you think you deserve a cut too?"

...................this could give you some serious problems..........

however if you are determined to get a piece of the action, this is what it seems you do.

hire a car in Bangkok or Pattaya and drive up to Laos border, hang around the sleezier bars etc and make your intentions known - I'm sure someone will offer to take the car off your hands. All you have to do then is tell the company the car has been stolen and pick up your "tea-money".

Personally I think that breaking the law is a seriously bad thing to do - but some people are just plain greedy.

This could go wrong anyway, because insurances don't cover the full value of the car (only about 80%) so the rental company can sue the customer to pay the difference or the rental time (90 days) until they got the money from the isurance because lost of profit.

Edited by stingray
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  • 2 months later...
Hi All,

I am doing business in Laos and someone recently told me that a car dealer in Oudomxay Province (northern Laos) is selling good quality pick-ups at cheap prices. They are stolen from Thailand - I would guess the north of Thailand. They come with all the legal documents required in Laos, so obviously some local officials are involved.

Is anyone here in this forum interested to take this up with the Thai police? If so, please send me a PM and I will then try to get the full details of the person selling the stolen pick-ups.

Best regards,

JB.

Why would you want to get yourself involved in this?

As you mention some officials are involved. Do you realise the amount of trouble you as a nosey foriegner will get yourself in??

Carry on "doing business in Laos" and take some advise.

Mind your own!!!!

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Can you (yourself) have a remote cut off engine in your vehicle and activated it if your vehicle is stolen ?

Is it common in Thailand and do you know any links for Thai companies doing tracking GPS vehicles ?

They have already "GPS Jammers", so basicly it's not a big help to install GPS Tracking Systems

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Hi All,

I am doing business in Laos and someone recently told me that a car dealer in Oudomxay Province (northern Laos) is selling good quality pick-ups at cheap prices. They are stolen from Thailand - I would guess the north of Thailand. They come with all the legal documents required in Laos, so obviously some local officials are involved.

Is anyone here in this forum interested to take this up with the Thai police? If so, please send me a PM and I will then try to get the full details of the person selling the stolen pick-ups.

Best regards,

JB.

Some years back, circa mid-1970s, this became an embarrassing problem for the old Lao government. Enterprising Thai newspaper reporters came up to Vientiane and somehow obtained VIN and engine numbers of lots of RHD cars, and published these in their Bangkok papers, Thai Rath, Daily News, etc. The Lao figured they really had to do something about this possible theft of vehicles from Thailand.

Their solution? Pass a new law which simply stated that the Lao "owner" of a RHD car could go to the Lao DMV and get a temporary registration valid for six months. If no one claimed ownership during that period, the temp was changed to a regular registration.

A simple and seemingly sensible Lao solution to the perceived problem.

Mac

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