hi all

back story ... i bought my phantom about 8 years ago when i lived in samui ( it has surathani reg plate)

i now live/stay in pattaya . i don't spend as much time in Thailand as i used to , so now i only get 90 day tourist visas when i come over the winter.

so about 4 years ago i did't come at all so there was a 2 year gap on my insurance disc thing , when i tried to bye a new one for that year (2009) the woman at honda told me i would have to pay about 2-3000b to sort it out ... + the 700-800b for 2009 disc . she told me i needed to re-register my bike in pattaya and get a pattaya plate, and i might need to go back to samui for some reason .... GF was no help at all .... so i told the woman at honda she was crazy , and that was that ..

i asked honda last year when i took my bike for service ( differrent honda shop ) and the woman there said she could sort it all for 1000b , , unfortunately i was on a massive bender that week and it never got sorted out

so wind on to now .. i still have samui plates on my bike and i have not bought a tax/insurance disc in 4 years . i want to sort this out . i have been to honda a few times and never get the same answer or price , they seen to just make it up , see a farang and start quoting mad prices to me

what do i need to do ? do i have to back pay ? do i really need pattaya plate ( i might move soon )

the green book is in my name ... if there is an address in the green book it will be my old samui address . not my condo address in pattaya

also , if i want to sell this bike , can i sell it on a 90 day tourist visa ?

thanks for any help or comments

Well firstly, you don't need to go to Honda at all, it has nothing to do with them.

As your bike is now more than 5 years old you will have to get a certificate saying your bike is road worthy. Only certain garages can give you this(it's a kinda yellow sign out front) The DLT can tell you where they are in Pattaya.(or someone here). Don't worry too much as they barely look at it, 60B in BKK.

Once you have that, take the green book to the DLT and get 1 years compulsory insurance, you don't have to back pay on that.

Then armed with your certificate and new insurance, go and get your tax. You will have to back pay for that, so 4 years would equal maybe 500Baht. No need to change plates. You don't even need ID.

Job done.

thanks for the reply Macknife. thought it would be easy .... my old GF just made everything hard work

The inspection station is across the road from the pattaya dmv...

You can have all this done by a shop which specializes in this service. They sell you the insurance, and they get the 'inspection' (which doesn't normally require anyone actually seeing the bike), and all other things, I think it is very cheap.

However I have been told that after about 3 years (not two), of lack of tax-payment, the ownership-book is cancelled and you have to ask for a new one to be made. This is of course difficult, and I think will cost at least 2,000 - I did it once with one bike I was buying, but I only had to pay for it and be there, the old lady I was buying it from actually did the communicating with the DMV.

You can have all this done by a shop which specializes in this service. They sell you the insurance, and they get the 'inspection' (which doesn't normally require anyone actually seeing the bike), and all other things, I think it is very cheap.

However I have been told that after about 3 years (not two), of lack of tax-payment, the ownership-book is cancelled and you have to ask for a new one to be made. This is of course difficult, and I think will cost at least 2,000 - I did it once with one bike I was buying, but I only had to pay for it and be there, the old lady I was buying it from actually did the communicating with the DMV.

I heard the same also from DLT in Pattaya 3 years your green book is crushed & you have to start over. You may have to go to Samui to sort out on that end. The new 3 year old rule makes buying a bike with reg out 3 years a joke. worth the price in scrap or parts only.

Good luck in sorting it out. The 2 places I used to use in Pattaya won't even touch bikes without the registration done in the 3 year time frame & since it is such a hassle for them as well as for us, they don't want to do it. You may at this point have better luck trying to have the insurance company you select(not the govn. insurance-mandantory) sort it out for a fee. I have seen other posters since the 3 year law came in affect pay the company whatever tea money to get it pushed through. Good luck on this adventure. Let us know how you get it done. Curious minds want to know.