Bribing Thai traffic cops can get you in trouble

[Kru Baa]

Look show proud they all look in this picture. Oh man If they could just realise how stupid they look to the rest of the world and how obvious their scams are, but I guess that is the root of the problem right there, and why nonsense like this will just keep going on.

[Kru Baa]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

Clearly this is not sustainable.

Either, motorists stop paying bribes and traffic police get frustrated.

Or, police department pays 10,000 bt every time and the money comes from where?

Money is not created from nothing.

What do you mean money isn't just created from nothing? Obviously you aren't from America. If you want more money you just print some more and call yourself rich.

[jaywalker]

So now we have sunk so low that we have to pay the police for being honest.

No such thing Buddy! At least 98% of the ones I've come across are crooks from the get-go.

A Dutch guy on Soi Khaotalo (Pattaya), with a very pretty wife & daughter about the same age as my daughter ran a public swimming pool/bar/restaurant near Eakmongkol 4 a few years back.

My daughter LOVED their daughter & we went there a lot, as did many a farang & many a Thai. Those kids would swim and swim and swim. I'd get in there chest deep & toss any kid that wanted a ride as far as as I could toss them. It was great exercise.

Nice folks all around = he was doing a good, wholesome, family friendly business, open from about 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM.

The police started harassing him for tea money left & right & ran him out of business.

There's an Al Capone with a badge & a brown uniform every 10 feet in Thailand.

Edited October 9, 2014 by jaywalker

[neverdie]

Maybe the guy was just unlucky enough to find the only honest cops in Bangkok. Or was it all a set up?

Mosha, would I be wrong in saying that it might never have even happened bu The BIB thought it would make them look good. Afterall, their reputation at present is taking one hell of a hammering from the international press.

I expect to see more of these idiotic stories in the coming days

"Officer BJ rescues a cat in Chain Mai"

"Constable Somchai gave directions to a lost foreigner"

"Pol Capt Turdsak donated free lunch to Burmese workers"

"

more like, officer bj has his way with the cat.

[soalbundy]

So now we have sunk so low that we have to pay the police for being honest.

No such thing Buddy! At least 98% of the ones I've come across are crooks from the get-go.

A Dutch guy on Soi Khaotalo, with a very pretty wife & daughter about the same age as my daughter ran a public swimming pool/bar/restaurant near Eakmongkol 4 a few years back.

My daughter LOVED their daughter & we went there a lot, as did many a farang & many a Thai. Those kids would swim and swim and swim. I'd get in there chest deep & toss any kid that wanted a ride as far as as I could toss them. It was great exercise.

Nice folks all around = he was doing a good, wholesome, family friendly business, open from about 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM.

The police started harassing him for tea money left & right & ran him out of business.

There's an Al Capone with a badge & a brown uniform every 10 feet in Thailand.

He could only be harassed if he was breaking the law in someway, no work permit perhaps, even the BIB have to have an excuse to shake you down

[Greg Nixon]

Hahahaha. !000's of Thais ride against the traffic flow every day even in cars and trucks. If I were to go out to the nearby highway i could stop 10 people in 30 minutes for this offence. You should always wait for the police to ask for your money. They will often say if you do not pay me 200 Baht now I will send you to the police station where you will be fined 500 baht. The news story is a show for higher authorities. Yes the police are saints who chose their victims wisely - those who are guilty of not having current registration or helmets - people of little means cannot complain. It is too expensive. A few motorists not wearing their seat belts. Meanwhile there are ten people riding in the open box of the vehicle or on top of large load too willing to be ejected and have their skulls split open.

My Thai wife was stopped for driving in the right lane on the highway instead of the left. hahahaha. People here do not even stop at stop signs, do not even look for approaching traffic sometimes. Driving in the wrong lane? There was not even any traffic. When have the police taken money from you and issued a receipt or ticket ?

Really driving the wrong way ? If the authorities higher than the police want to clean up the police demand that the police issue thousands of traffic tickets for the offence of driving the wrong way to be paid at police stations. That would be a starter.

[luk AJ]

So when do they stop the practice to take your driving license? I have no problem paying a fine. But i need my license as driving without is illegal!

This country is getting worser every day.

are you living in Thailand? When police fines you officially, they will confiscate your drivers license. You get it back when the fine is paid. Meanwhile you can continue to drive without license, based on a paper they give you. Nice thing is that police will not fine you a second time during that day:)

Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect Thailand

[jaywalker]

Maybe the guy was just unlucky enough to find the only honest cops in Bangkok. Or was it all a set up?

Mosha, would I be wrong in saying that it might never have even happened bu The BIB thought it would make them look good. Afterall, their reputation at present is taking one hell of a hammering from the international press.

I expect to see more of these idiotic stories in the coming days

"Officer BJ rescues a cat in Chain Mai"

"Constable Somchai gave directions to a lost foreigner"

"Pol Capt Turdsak donated free lunch to Burmese workers"

"

more like, officer bj has his way with the cat.

Pol Captain Turdsak Nice one!

Probably will be more like Police Admiral General Turdsak, Commander of the blah, blah,blah,blah,blah,blah,blah,blah,blah,blah, District of the blah,blah,blah,blah,

for 4 lines, donated a free lunch to leprous Burmese & Cambodian refugees and made merit by doing so.

[Greg Nixon]

Actually that was one of the first things the police said about those murdered at koh Tao, that they were dressed inappropriately. ( no wonder the girl was raped) police implied.

ANYONE who's been stopped and racketed at least once (and that means EVERYONE) by dirty cops here will feel really angry reading this piece of news.

The kind of anger that girls who've been raped feel when they hear someone suggesting that they provoked the rapist with their itsy-bitsy bikini and thus brought disaster on themselves ...

[Greg Nixon]

You couldnt make it up, its like something from Enid blytons toy town

That Enid Blyton what a rabble rousing anarchist hahahaha.

[poostick]

I always say I have no cash and ask for a ticket instead, One dude wanted 500 baht for me going left at the lights which were on red. He gave up in the end and didn't even bother with a ticket.

[Pundi6446]

Wish they would offer the same reward to citizens who report officers extorting bribes. Definitely could improve the median household income level in Thailand.

Yes wouldn't that be nice, I can see it now, they accuse you of bribing them to get the 10,000 baht reward now.

[Soiyamoto]

My wifes friend's daughter was crossing a road yesterday morning in khon kaen when a speeding motorist hit and killed her then failed to stop..8years old. I cannot imagine the grief that family are going through now.. How can that dirty piece of rat shit live with him/herself ? Do they go to the temple and say sorry and everything be ok? The roads in thailand are trecherous RIP that little girl. I had to pay police 200bt on motorway he said i was speeding at 117 kilomete pr hr i asked him how he new he said he see and write my speed down on his piece of paper.. He radio'd to the cashier sitting down an embankement saying hey we gotta farrang here my wife went to pay he wanted 400bt she pleaded with him so he took 200bt. Its a strange old place is LOS

[wantan]

So when do they stop the practice to take your driving license? I have no problem paying a fine. But i need my license as driving without is illegal!

This country is getting worser every day.

are you living in Thailand? When police fines you officially, they will confiscate your drivers license. You get it back when the fine is paid. Meanwhile you can continue to drive without license, based on a paper they give you. Nice thing is that police will not fine you a second time during that day:)

And what happens next day when i get stopped again? Do they then exchange the paper with another paper? Maybe you have the time to always go to police station to get your license back, i do not. And as they are making up offences you cannot avoid to be accused.

Taking your license for a minor offense is only done because they do not trust their own officers to collect the money. Imo they could stop this practice now as no officer is corrupt anymore and they all will do their work properly.

[ZAKY]

These guys are unbelievable. So they target the civilians by making them pay a larger fine. Why not target the corrupt cops? This country is so back asswards it is amazing. Now the policeman doesn't need to get a 200bt bribe when he can get 10000bt. Speechless

ahahahaha !!!! I like this joke of the year ! The police refuse a bribe of thb 100 to get a better bribe of thb 10,000

[54321]

Conversely I have driven from Bangkok to hat yai and back about 20 times, and have been stopped at road checks about 5 times and when they saw I was a foreigner just waved me on. The only time they spoke was at a road check point about 2 hours north of hat yai. They asked where we were going, we said Bangkok, they replied "in that" and grinned then waved us off (our car is in its late teens). I drive nearly every day in BKK and don't remember ever being stopped.

Not saying they are perfect, but that's simply my experience of the traffic police (wish I could say the same for the boys in brown in the banglampoo area)

I remember driving from Khon kaen to pattaya once and I can't even remember how many times I was pulled over by traffic cops during that journey! And for no reason accept that they seen a white ATM driving! These corrupt scumbags could only say one line in English and that was 100 baht please! They are the most corrupted and no matter if I challenged them as to why they were giving me a fine they couldn't answer as they didn't understand English which was very convenient for them.

I give up trying to ask for a receipt of proof of payment and asking for a reason, it's tot tall sticking to give in to these low life twisted scumbags but what can you do???

[MediaWatcher]

Your shouldn't have to reward them for being honest, in most countries if a cop takes a bribe he/she is suspended, from duty, and charged. One assumes not all "honest" cops will receive 10000 baht, I would also, being cynical, suspect these cops were hand picked.

[BusyB]

"Accepting" bribes?

[sz1a]

This is smart. If it's 10,000, people will stop bribing in fear of the police reporting them. Hence, they will rather take a 400 baht ticket at the station. If no one bribes the cops anymore, having so many traffic checkpoints will no longer be lucrative for the police and just more work for them. And since going to the station sucks, people might just opt for not breaking the law in the first place. Poor cops..

Edited October 9, 2014 by sz1a

[animatic]

So how many people will piss off a Thai cop,

who then stitches them up for a fake bribe,

so he can get the 10K payout?

[Maestro]

Great, first they establish the procedure, which is, you ask how much do you want? And now they are encouraged to entrap you for it.

So how will we go about paying when they stop you at a checkpoint? I need a new script.

I think the smartest is to keep quite and let the police do all the talking and see if he wants a fine with an official receipt or a bribe and try to record it with either your mobile phone or if you got a car cam you can turn to the policeman's direction.

Are traffic police officers allowed to collect fines on the spot?

[VINCENT2012]

the military government should give that money to the drivers or all people who says that this police officer or member of the government want a brib......!and with a photo pointig him or her with the finger

not only police take money , almost all of the people working for the government....it is a virus and evrybody is contaminated because it last sine long long time.

normal citizen people did not invente the brib ....all corupted people did it.

[Maestro]

Stupid me was thinking this 10,000 was on top of the annual salary - not for every single incident. I will never pay a cop ever again from now on, and demand the correct paperwork and pay the fine thru the post.

Is it possible in Thailand to pay a traffic fine through the post?

[luk AJ]

Great, first they establish the procedure, which is, you ask how much do you want? And now they are encouraged to entrap you for it.

So how will we go about paying when they stop you at a checkpoint? I need a new script.

I think the smartest is to keep quite and let the police do all the talking and see if he wants a fine with an official receipt or a bribe and try to record it with either your mobile phone or if you got a car cam you can turn to the policeman's direction.

Are traffic police officers allowed to collect fines on the spot?

sometimes they have a booth at the road side and give you official receipt. I experienced this on my way from BKK to Phitchit.

Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect Thailand

[Alwyn]

Unbelievable. The payments are almost solely a result of extortion! So now the country's finest will be asking for 200 baht or however much is in their head and then you're in trouble for succumbing to their extortion. This will probably impact tourists more than seasoned ex-pats.

[Yann55]

ANYONE who's been stopped and racketed at least once (and that means EVERYONE) by dirty cops here will feel really angry reading this piece of news.

The kind of anger that girls who've been raped feel when they hear someone suggesting that they provoked the rapist with their itsy-bitsy bikini and thus brought disaster on themselves ...

Actually that was one of the first things the police said about those murdered at koh Tao, that they were dressed inappropriately. ( no wonder the girl was raped) police implied.

Of course I was referring to that event, but it wasn't the police who said that, Greg. It wasn't the police ....

[Fred Flinstone]

More absolute Comedy

[hawker9000]

Great. So now they're bribing police officers to not accept bribes... The fact that it's their DUTY and their RESPONSIBILITY and PART OF THE JOB to not do so ain't enough - they have to offer them a B10K bribe not to do it. Wonderful. What a powerful message THAT sends. And who's caught in the middle? Why the motorist of course who probably wasn't even violating any traffic laws in the first place!

Edited October 9, 2014 by hawker9000

[canuckamuck]

Is there a reward for a policeman who refuses the 10k bribe too?

[bdenner]

How much is the bribe to get the officer to say you didn't offer the bribe you weren't offering?

Without reading all 9 pages I'd say 10K Baht