Thai'S Voting Overseas

[OZEMADE]

My Thai wife wanted to vote while she is on holidays in Australia. She contacted the Thai Embassy in Sydney and was told she had to have her name crossed off the list last month, MAY. This would enable her to legally vote on the 18th or the 19th of JUNE this month. All sounds a bit strange to me. She could have had her name crossed off the so called list last week when she rang and still would have had 15 days to vote. Then the embassy sends the voting papers over to Thailand on the plane or maby they don't send them at all. I Smell a RAT. I wonder if this goes on all over the world, it would involve thousands of votes for Thai's who want to vote.Sorry, the bottom line is she can't Vote.

Edited June 11, 2011 by OZEMADE

[Richb2004v2]

Did you know that voting affects them in all kinds of ways. My wife never voted for the 5 years she was overseas. It seems this is recorded and counts against you as a good citizen. The bank brought it up once when she went for a loan. Brilliant!

[afarang]

Ozemade, sorry ,but you did not go to an Embassy,rather ,you went to a Consulate. There is only one Embassy per country and it is located in the Capital City of that country. In this case ,Canberra. Sadly , Consulates are not always up to scratch on everything, as they are Honorary positions. You really need to check with the Embassy in Canberra, to make sure you got the correct information. We had a problem ,with my sons Thai Passport .Not possible to cure it at the Consulate in Melbourne. It necessitated a trip to Canberra , to the Embassy. A terrible waste of time and money, but had to be done.

[samran]

Did you know that voting affects them in all kinds of ways. My wife never voted for the 5 years she was overseas. It seems this is recorded and counts against you as a good citizen. The bank brought it up once when she went for a loan. Brilliant!

The main impact is that you are ineligible to run for public office if you did not vote in the previous election. Dumb rule, admittedly, but doesn't impact too many people. Once you start voting again, subsequent elections are open to you again.

[jdinasia]

Ozemade, sorry ,but you did not go to an Embassy,rather ,you went to a Consulate. There is only one Embassy per country and it is located in the Capital City of that country. In this case ,Canberra. Sadly , Consulates are not always up to scratch on everything, as they are Honorary positions. You really need to check with the Embassy in Canberra, to make sure you got the correct information. We had a problem ,with my sons Thai Passport .Not possible to cure it at the Consulate in Melbourne. It necessitated a trip to Canberra , to the Embassy. A terrible waste of time and money, but had to be done.

point of order -- not all consulates are Honorary Consulates. Sydney is a regular consulate (not honorary.)

[Richb2004v2]

Did you know that voting affects them in all kinds of ways. My wife never voted for the 5 years she was overseas. It seems this is recorded and counts against you as a good citizen. The bank brought it up once when she went for a loan. Brilliant!

The main impact is that you are ineligible to run for public office if you did not vote in the previous election. Dumb rule, admittedly, but doesn't impact too many people. Once you start voting again, subsequent elections are open to you again.

When she went for a loan they said she didn't have a good credit rating. This was largely because she didn't work so had no regular deposits in the back. However they also pointed out that she hadn't voted many times. When she told them she'd been living overseas they asked why she had not gone to vote at the embassy. They didn't get that not everyone lives in London. So it is recorded somewhere.

[moe666]

A few countries want there citizens to vote, instead of discouraging them.

[TigerWan]

Voting absentee means planning ahead, otherwise a lot of fake ballots would be cast.

Thank stars they aren't using electronic ballot machines, yet.

[englishinsiam]

Whats the point of Voting in Thailand? Once one lot get in the other lot campaign and protest against it.

My wife has no intention of voting she is intelligent enough to see it's a waste of time.

[samran]

Did you know that voting affects them in all kinds of ways. My wife never voted for the 5 years she was overseas. It seems this is recorded and counts against you as a good citizen. The bank brought it up once when she went for a loan. Brilliant!

The main impact is that you are ineligible to run for public office if you did not vote in the previous election. Dumb rule, admittedly, but doesn't impact too many people. Once you start voting again, subsequent elections are open to you again.

When she went for a loan they said she didn't have a good credit rating. This was largely because she didn't work so had no regular deposits in the back. However they also pointed out that she hadn't voted many times. When she told them she'd been living overseas they asked why she had not gone to vote at the embassy. They didn't get that not everyone lives in London. So it is recorded somewhere.

Not unusual to use the electoral roll as the basis for credit ratings.

When my wife and I moved to the UK (both non-EU nationals) we were told the best way to get a start a good credit rating is to get on the voting rolls.

Being Australian/NZ citizens we were allowed to vote in the UK, so we enrolled. We were told - in the UK - that credit providers look favourably upon people who enroll to vote!

Lo and behold, after the information had been digested the credit cards that we were told we weren't eligible for a few weeks before hand we suddenly available to us. Our credit score had risen!!

I'm in a similar circumstance now - temporarily living outside of Thailand, and not near a Thai embassy. Lets see what happens, though I still use my Thai credit cards and get a regular A+ on my credit report which my CC companies send me annually.

Edited June 14, 2011 by samran

[thaihome]

Registration for absentee voters opens June 13

By The Nation

ink

Absentee voters are obligated to complete the registration process from June 13 to June 17 before casting advance ballots on June 26, Election Commission member Prapun Naigowit said on Wednesday.

The advance votes will be tallied along with ballots cast on July 3.

To qualify for advance balloting, voters would have to fill out a form and submit a reference to verify why they could not be present on the voting day. They could complete the form in person at the district office of their domicile, or the designated district in case of voting outside the constituency or the designated embassy and consulate in case of voting abroad.

There are three options for advance voting - within the constituency, outside the constituency and abroad.

Should absentee voters fail to show up for advance balloting, they are still entitled to vote on the balloting day at the designated polling station.

[rick75]

I called the Consul in Brisbane today on behalf of my wife and was told She had missed the boat, voting closed on the 2nd of June for overseas voters.

It kind of blew me away I had looked on there website a couple of weeks back and no mention of the election or how to vote, could it be they don't want those that have seen a little of the outside World to vote?