Hi all,

I''m soon to be married to my thai boyfriend, he runs a small cafe, and I would like to work for him (not wait staff or prohibited professions). I'm aware that there will have to be 1 million baht registered capital, and that he will have to employ 2x thai employees. Just a couple of questions...

1. Can he count as being 1 of the employees?

2. What is the minimum allowable wage for the thai employees per month, and what is the tax payable?

3. Is there a minimum salary for me as a spouse? I've heard no...What's the minimum tax that I would have to pay?

4. I don't understand the whole paid-up registered capital thing...does that mean that my husband would have to show this much money in a bank account?! I spoke to a lawyer yesterday and he said yes! I hope not, because it's only a small business...therefore making the whole thing impossible!

5. A friend has offered to sell me a company that was orginally set up for purchasing property...the property is soon to be sold, so the company is no longer needed. Would this help us with the registered capital side of things? Or do you need to have the paid up capital when you apply for the work permit?

Far out...this stuff is so confusing! Any help would be really appreciated. Cheers!

This appears to be continuation from this earlier topic, which I have now closed:

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/638482-farang-female-married-to-thaihelping-him-with-his-business/

Hmm, kind of, but it's a whole new set of questions. Please don't close me...i beg you :-)

1. The Labour Ministry's Dept of Employment (DOE) which issues work permits lists the business' prior month record of Social Tax payments as the document it needs to see as evidence of the required Thai employees. Unfortunately the Social Security Office (SSO) will not allow business owners, including directors, shareholders, partners or sole proprietors to be enrolled in the Social Security scheme which seems to mean that your husband as business owner would not be counted as one of the Thai employees. Logically they should be able to accept the PND 1 monthly record of tax withheld from salaries instead, assuming he drews a monthly salary, but I don't think they do.

Another issue is that previous 2004 regulations allowed for only 2 Thai employees for those married to Thais but this concession seems to have been dropped from the current 2011 regulations which only mention 4 Thai employees for all. The different offices seem to have some discretion to allow only 2 employees and may require you to write them a letter to explain why.

2. The minimum national wage is now Bt 300 a day for non-graduates and Bt 15,000 a month for bachelors degree graduates. For non-graduates you can either pay them according to the number of days worked in the month or set a monthly salary that is equivalent to no less than Bt 300 a day in the months that have the greatest number of working days. You have to give at least one day off a week.

Social tax for 2013 is payable at the rate of 4% up to a maximum of Bt 600 a month for the employer's contribution and the same for the employee's contribution which is deducted from their salaries.

Income tax has to be withheld from employees monthly but the first Bt 150,000 a year is exempt and there is also a personal deduction of Bt 30,000 a year and another deduction of 40% of salary up to a maximum of Bt 60,000 a year. So income tax does not apply to minimum wage employees but the employer has to file the monthly PNG 1 report of withholding tax for them nevertheless.

3. Previously the DOE set no minimum salaries for work permits but the current regulations refer to Immigration's minimum salary scales by nationality groupings which require Bt 50,000 a month for Europeans, North Americans and Australasians, except for teachers who have a much lower salary scale. I don't think this is absolutely set in stone by the DOE like it is by Immigration. This is a cross reference to another government agency's requirements rather than a DOE requirement. Immigration spent years trying to persuade the Labour and Foreign Ministries (vis a vis visas issued in Thai embassies abroad) to adopt the same tough standards as them and at last they have been partially successful. Immigration's regulations provide no concession on minimum salary for spouses of Thai nationals.

4. Limited companies have to pay a fee to the registrar based on their desired level of registered capital on incorporation. This registered capital is the maximum paid-up capital they may without paying a higher fee to increase it. When you pay the capital into the company it becomes paid-up. E.g. you have a company with Bt 1 million in registered capital and start by paying only Bt 500,000 into the company's bank account; the company's accounts will record this as Registered capital - 1 million, Paid-up capital 500,000. Later you can pay up the rest but some companies may not pay up the full amount of registered capital for years, if ever. Sunbelt (one of TV's sponsors) legal section suggests that the DOE needs to see at least 25% of the registered capital fully paid up and still in the company's accounts in the form of cash or assets. This point would need further checking but it suggests you could get away with a minimum of Bt 250,000 cash paid in to the company which can also be used for purchase of assets like fixtures and fittings, although these are subject to annual depreciation in the accounts.

5. DON'T purchase a company that has been used for illegal purchase of land on behalf of a foreigner! This company has probably been involved in criminal violations of the Land Code and the Foreign Business Act and you or your husband don't want to take the risk of being hauled in for questioning about its past activities that you know nothing about. There may also be contingent liabilities in the form of unpaid debts to do with non payment of corporate income tax following the sale of property or previous years' accounts. The Revenue Department can go back several years and an investigation by them will usually cost you either in fines or bribes. There may also be unpaid bills in connection with the property, such as communal service fees or utility bills. Buying a second hand company will not help with the registered or paid-up capital because the registered capital is easy to do for yourself for a small fee and the seller would not give away his paid up capital free of charge.

If you want a limited company, set up your own clean company. It is not that expensive and takes about 3 weeks. It is simple enough that you can do it yourself, if you have time for a few trips to the BDD without bothering with a lawyer. The minimum fee for registered capital is Bt 5,000 which gives you the Bt 1 million registered capital you need. The DOE is usually more lenient on the number of Thai employees for a new company applying for a work permit in the first year. So you give up this advantage, if you use a second hand company.

There are also various partnership structures including those registered like companies with the comanies' registrar, the Business Development Depart (BDD) at the Commerce Ministry and those that are registered with the BDD but are registered for tax with the Revenue Department. I think the registered type are subject to the nearly the same requirements as limited companies and offer little or no advantage. Unregistered partnerships are like sole proprietorships run by partners. All of these business entities can technically employ foreigners and obtain work permits but the DOE prefers to deal with limited companies these days because they have a more clearly defined structure and reporting requirements. If they allow a sole proprietorship or partnership to get a work permit, they are quite likely to add a condition in the back of the work permit that they will need to see audited accounts to renew the work permit next time. That means you would lose the advantage of a sole proprietorship or unregistered partnership that is not otherwise obliged to file audited accounts with the Revenue Department. Another issue is that the business needs to show its VAT registration certificate to get a work permit. So you will have to register for VAT and file monthly VAT returns even if the business' revenue is below the VAT threshhold of, I think, Bt 1,8 million a year. You will have to add 7% VAT to your prices but you will be able to reclaim VAT from your suppliers, assuming they are not running cash only black economy businesses themselves.

My feeling is that a sole proprietorship or partnership that has a work permit is subjected to additional levels of filing and scrutiny to the extent that there is no longer any point in those structures and you may as well use a limited company. I don't know how the BDD assesses the Bt 1 million capital in sole proprietorships since that is just like doing business yourself and there is no registered capital. They might want to see Bt 1 million capital in the personal bank account. Unregistered partnerships have a sort of equivalent of registered capital which is how much each partner agrees to contribute as capital stock and that determines how much share of the profit he is entitled to. They might expect to see this fully paid up. Probably the limited company structure with its official level of registered capital and separate amount of paid-up capital offers the most flexibility.

Before going to any trouble or expense, please go along to your local DOE and ask them, if they are likely to be able to issue a work permit and what would be the conditions. Things do vary at different DOEs around the country.

Edited May 12, 201313 yr by Arkady

1. The Labour Ministry's Dept of Employment (DOE) which issues work permits lists the business' prior month record of Social Tax payments as the document it needs to see as evidence of the required Thai employees. Unfortunately the Social Security Office (SSO) will not allow business owners, including directors, shareholders, partners or sole proprietors to be enrolled in the Social Security scheme which seems to mean that your husband as business owner would not be counted as one of the Thai employees. Logically they should be able to accept the PND 1 monthly record of tax withheld from salaries instead, assuming he drews a monthly salary, but I don't think they do.

<snip>

Directors, shareholders, etc can be enrolled for social security, but they would have to be paid a salary.

My wife registered a sole proprietor ship in 2010. After that we visited the labor office and applied for a work-permit for me as her husband. I got a work permit with the only extra requirement that I teach 1 staff yearly.

We have 2 staff part time working at the wage of 300 Thb a day. We pay social security and taxes for the staff and for me. Every six months the accountant files the papers at the tax office and we get a kor bor 9.(with extension nr ) form needed for immigration.

For Social security the staff can not be the wife (owner) or any family member. Even myself. as employee, can not have the social security based on the fact that I'm married to the owner, so I'm family.

Every year I extend my work permit at the labor office myself, bring one staff with the form of education staff, signed by staff. Short interview with staff, check of all copies, 100 Thb fee and 1 week later the work permit get extended for 1 year with the fee of 3600 Thb.

After that visit Immigration, bring all the papers including tax payments, social security payments and get 1 month extension, within the month get phone call from Immigration to get the full year extension.

For the sole proprietor ship was no money in the bank needed. A visit of about 15 min to the office was enough to get the papers against a fee of 50 Thb. Make sure you have several names, they refused the first three names we choosed.

Work permit application done by myself, takes a few visits to get all the papers, but stay nice, keep smiling.

Visa first time very hard, because sole proprietor ship just opened, so no proof of 1 year minimum salary for me.

In south Thailand the extension for 1 year based on work is giving by Songkla head office, contact them and they speak good English and willing to help you out.

I call Songkla every year and asked for needed forms, make sure I have them all in 2 sets and hand that over to Krabi Immigration.

They always ask for more papers or tell me papers are incorrect, I just call Songkla in front of officer, before the call the papers are normally suddenly all okay and send off to Songkla.

We did it all by ourselfs with a little help of a friend for translations. Sole proprietor, TAT license, work permit and visa all done in less than 2 months with a total costs of 20.000 Thb.

All the extensions in the last 2 years all done my ourselfs and it works as long as you follow the rules, be nice ask them to help and keep on smiling in the office. Outside you can kick what ever you like to calm down.

We run a tour operator, my work permit is for General Manager, so no sales or direct contact with customers but only managing tasks and

as Free lance Scuba Diving Instructor which give me the freedom of talking to customers, sale dive tours, join them on dive tours as Instructor for our own shop or rent myself out to other shops to take care their customers.

Or even helping out with monitoring, protecting and conserving the marine natural resources on voluntary basis.

My wife registered a sole proprietor ship in 2010. After that we visited the labor office and applied for a work-permit for me as her husband. I got a work permit with the only extra requirement that I teach 1 staff yearly.

We have 2 staff part time working at the wage of 300 Thb a day. We pay social security and taxes for the staff and for me. Every six months the accountant files the papers at the tax office and we get a kor bor 9.(with extension nr ) form needed for immigration.

For Social security the staff can not be the wife (owner) or any family member. Even myself. as employee, can not have the social security based on the fact that I'm married to the owner, so I'm family.

Every year I extend my work permit at the labor office myself, bring one staff with the form of education staff, signed by staff. Short interview with staff, check of all copies, 100 Thb fee and 1 week later the work permit get extended for 1 year with the fee of 3600 Thb.

After that visit Immigration, bring all the papers including tax payments, social security payments and get 1 month extension, within the month get phone call from Immigration to get the full year extension.

For the sole proprietor ship was no money in the bank needed. A visit of about 15 min to the office was enough to get the papers against a fee of 50 Thb. Make sure you have several names, they refused the first three names we choosed.

Work permit application done by myself, takes a few visits to get all the papers, but stay nice, keep smiling.

Visa first time very hard, because sole proprietor ship just opened, so no proof of 1 year minimum salary for me.

In south Thailand the extension for 1 year based on work is giving by Songkla head office, contact them and they speak good English and willing to help you out.

I call Songkla every year and asked for needed forms, make sure I have them all in 2 sets and hand that over to Krabi Immigration.

They always ask for more papers or tell me papers are incorrect, I just call Songkla in front of officer, before the call the papers are normally suddenly all okay and send off to Songkla.

We did it all by ourselfs with a little help of a friend for translations. Sole proprietor, TAT license, work permit and visa all done in less than 2 months with a total costs of 20.000 Thb.

All the extensions in the last 2 years all done my ourselfs and it works as long as you follow the rules, be nice ask them to help and keep on smiling in the office. Outside you can kick what ever you like to calm down.

We run a tour operator, my work permit is for General Manager, so no sales or direct contact with customers but only managing tasks and

as Free lance Scuba Diving Instructor which give me the freedom of talking to customers, sale dive tours, join them on dive tours as Instructor for our own shop or rent myself out to other shops to take care their customers.

Or even helping out with monitoring, protecting and conserving the marine natural resources on voluntary basis.

Sorry, this post is posted with the Idea that I was logged in. After posting I saw that the log in was still on name of my good friend who just used my computer.

I will check better next time before posting.

What exactly is it you are looking to gain from this? The Visa or a Work permit? You will get a Marriage visa after you are married anyways. You can also simply be just the owner of the business with 49% shares and get a visa and WP.

All very simple actually

1. The Labour Ministry's Dept of Employment (DOE) which issues work permits lists the business' prior month record of Social Tax payments as the document it needs to see as evidence of the required Thai employees. Unfortunately the Social Security Office (SSO) will not allow business owners, including directors, shareholders, partners or sole proprietors to be enrolled in the Social Security scheme which seems to mean that your husband as business owner would not be counted as one of the Thai employees. Logically they should be able to accept the PND 1 monthly record of tax withheld from salaries instead, assuming he drews a monthly salary, but I don't think they do.

<snip>

Directors, shareholders, etc can be enrolled for social security, but they would have to be paid a salary.

The Social Security Act doesn't define what is meant by an employee clearly and the Supreme Court has come up with a ruling that defies all logic common law notions of the corporate veil. See this thread http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/104239-do-directors-and-shareholders-have-legal-status-as-an-employee/ . Nevertheless, some SSO branch offices will register them if they have salaries, as you say. There is no consistency. Depending on where some one lives, they might get access to social security healthcare and a pension of Bt 6k a month. What a great system!

1. The Labour Ministry's Dept of Employment (DOE) which issues work permits lists the business' prior month record of Social Tax payments as the document it needs to see as evidence of the required Thai employees. Unfortunately the Social Security Office (SSO) will not allow business owners, including directors, shareholders, partners or sole proprietors to be enrolled in the Social Security scheme which seems to mean that your husband as business owner would not be counted as one of the Thai employees. Logically they should be able to accept the PND 1 monthly record of tax withheld from salaries instead, assuming he drews a monthly salary, but I don't think they do.

<snip>

Directors, shareholders, etc can be enrolled for social security, but they would have to be paid a salary.

The Social Security Act doesn't define what is meant by an employee clearly and the Supreme Court has come up with a ruling that defies all logic common law notions of the corporate veil. See this thread http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/104239-do-directors-and-shareholders-have-legal-status-as-an-employee/ . Nevertheless, some SSO branch offices will register them if they have salaries, as you say. There is no consistency. Depending on where some one lives, they might get access to social security healthcare and a pension of Bt 6k a month. What a great system!

In this case, it's not the system that is the issue, it's whether the husband counts as an employee. In my company, we have shareholders and directors as employees.

Robert. Interesting that you could get a work permit and renewals with the sole proprietorship, only 2 Thai employees and no evidence of Bt 1 million in the business. I would think this is not possible everywhere, particularly in places with loads of foreigners like Bkk and elsewhere. If it were, word would get round and everyone married to a Thai and wanting to set up a small business would go the sole proprietorship route. A limited company only offers advantages when your profit grows to the point that a company pays less tax than an individual and when you can borrow from banks and other enough to make the limited liability a useful factor. At that point you could fold the business into a company or start a company as a second business unit. It goes to show that it is worth going to the local DOE office for information before going to any trouble and expense.

Who did you register the name with? As I understand it sole proprietorships don't need to register with the Business Development Department which reserves business names, in the same way as companies and registered partnerships do.

Why do you get a NON-IMM B visa and extensions? Surely a NON-IMM O visa and extensions based on marriage to a Thai would be easier.

Edited May 13, 201313 yr by Arkady

1. The Labour Ministry's Dept of Employment (DOE) which issues work permits lists the business' prior month record of Social Tax payments as the document it needs to see as evidence of the required Thai employees. Unfortunately the Social Security Office (SSO) will not allow business owners, including directors, shareholders, partners or sole proprietors to be enrolled in the Social Security scheme which seems to mean that your husband as business owner would not be counted as one of the Thai employees. Logically they should be able to accept the PND 1 monthly record of tax withheld from salaries instead, assuming he drews a monthly salary, but I don't think they do.

<snip>

Directors, shareholders, etc can be enrolled for social security, but they would have to be paid a salary.

The Social Security Act doesn't define what is meant by an employee clearly and the Supreme Court has come up with a ruling that defies all logic common law notions of the corporate veil. See this thread http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/104239-do-directors-and-shareholders-have-legal-status-as-an-employee/ . Nevertheless, some SSO branch offices will register them if they have salaries, as you say. There is no consistency. Depending on where some one lives, they might get access to social security healthcare and a pension of Bt 6k a month. What a great system!

In this case, it's not the system that is the issue, it's whether the husband counts as an employee. In my company, we have shareholders and directors as employees.

It is the system that is at issue. Many people who would like to be registered for Social Security are denied on the grounds that they are shareholders and/or directors and the Supreme Court decision justifies barring those who are not regarded as being totally under the company's discipline. If you look in Thai language forums you will see many posts from people who are trying to take legal action against the SSO for denying them membership. One guy on Pantip.com complained that his local SSO kicked him out of the system after 10 years because his employer gave him 10 shares worth Bt 1,000 as a bonus and he is not a director. I think Thai people deserve a bureaucracy that treats them all equally, regardless of where they live and work and what side of the bed a civil servant got out off that day.

Hmm, kind of, but it's a whole new set of questions. Please don't close me...i beg you :-)

It seems that you have completely ignored the no-nonsense, straight to the point, good advice you have been given already - both in this forum and via private message - and the risks you are exposed to right now if you are genuinely what you say you are. The fact that the 'future hubby' wants you to put 1 million baht into his 'little' cafe says it all. But now you say he (or someone close to him) is trying to get you to purchase an established company and pay you 'a wage' equal to that a Thai would be paid. If that is true (and with all of your contradictions I'm begining to suspect a troll exercise here) you had better (as already advised) drop your marriage plans and get the hell out of Thailand. You and your naivety are walking into a disaster zone, and if you are unable to see that by now then you are evidently getting closer to finding out the hard way. You won't enjoy that trip.

Whoa whoa whoa...settle down there. I'm not ignoring anything. The advice that I've been given on this forum is great! Thanks for all of your help everyone. I'm not naive, I'm asking questions for a reason, and that is to become informed on how everything works here. You never know until you ask, right? And I'm not just asking on this forum either...I'm asking friends, lawyers, the ministry of labour, and the department of immigration. The problem is that every single person that I speak to gives me a different answer.

For everyone who has warned me via private message that my thai husband is going to steal my money and leave me on the road side, I urge you to stop this dialogue with me. I did not ask for advice in this matter...please, I'm not interested.

It looks like I won't be able to work for my husbands business in the future, because of all of the costs involved :-( With such a small business it's just not practical to hire a farang.

To everyone who's got straight to the point and answered my questions, I really appreciate it, it's been really helpful.

1 flame deleted.

In a short answer: most probably not

If your ultimate purpose of 'working for him', is to extend your stay in the Kingdom, you should consider other avenues:

- Marriage visa (regulations for farang female spouses of thai husbands, are far more lax afaik)

- Study visa (Non-ED) by enrolling in a Thai language course (this is probably the easiest option)

- Seek employment with a regular company in Thailand that will employ you as a foreigner with a Non-B visa & a WP