Scam artists destroying image of Thai tourism

[Stargeezr]

There have been Touts, or scam artists in Thailand since I can remember. I started visiting

the country in the nineties and I remember one tout at the bus stop near the reclining Buddha

statue, he was dressed like a pilot, and was trying to get me to go to a temple, that is only open 3 days

per year. Only 500 baht for the special tour! I flew into the Don Muang airport back then, and my

taxi driver told be it was 200 baht to the hotel, then half the way there he changed the priced to 500 baht.

When I got to the hotel I had a nice, huge doorman let the driver know that I would only pay the

200 baht or the doorman would get 300 baht to pound the driver into the ground for me. I did end

up paying the driver only 200 baht, and gave the doorman a 100 baht tip for

saving me the money.

I am glad to see that some people are getting some attention to this issue, as it will always

sour the tourists visit, as it did mine.

I am glad that I learned early, not to be trusting and to remember that I am in a foreign

country that is not at all like my own.

Still love the tropical weather and the ocean beaches, and of course great Thai food,

so I will be visiting Thailand for several more trips in the future.

Edited January 20, 2015 by Stargrazer9889

[BMF1960]

This is somewhat of a simplication. Sure, the scam artists are spoiling the reputation of the Kingdom, but there are many other issues that contribute to its star losing its shine.

[chooka]

the best way to stop this is to if possoble ban the social media

The new Computer Crimes Act (CCA) has this very point in mind.

and the new hate speech laws for added punch.

[chooka]

Nothing will ever happen about this scam. Past and present governments are involved in charging foreigners more to get into parks etc.These scam run from the P.M right down to somchia the rice farmer. People see the government doing so they assume it is all ok.

[chooka]

For those members who feel they have suggestions for the minister, here are contact details from the website.

I am sure they will appreciate farang suggestions, as they always do.

Office of the Minister

โทรศัพท์สายตรง : 0-2356-0703

โทรศัพท์ภายใน : 1550

E - Mail : [email protected]

So now ThaiVisa will send an email on behalf of its members enquiring about why the Jetski scam is allowed to continue???

Oh look a whole squadron of flying pigs!!!

The jet ski scam has been raised over and over for years on years by so many people including foreign governments and nothing has been done. Thai's just bare thier naked butt in the faces of foreigners and laugh. Nothing will ever change.

[kingalfred]

Lonely Planet were running pages on the Bangkok tourist scams two decades ago. Didn't seem to affect tourist numbers disastrously over the last 20 years so I fear that the ThaiV drama queens are in for a big disappointment licking their lips over the destruction of the industry.

Its taking a "big hit" if you didnt know it. Why do you think TAT are having massive promotions to try and raise the numbers. The only "drama" is the ineffective way TAT try and boost tourism, its comical! Edited January 21, 2015 by kingalfred

[hawker9000]

This is somewhat of a simplication. Sure, the scam artists are spoiling the reputation of the Kingdom, but there are many other issues that contribute to its star losing its shine.

Very very true.

Sad to see what was once and not so long ago a rising star with such great promise now in such steep decline.

[chawengnoy]

It is not just the Thais who rip off tourists and visitoes

Try this guy for someone who is all by himself trying to undermine confidence in people booking stuff in Thailand

http://www.jermaineholliehead.com/

What a really nice guy!!

[Andrew65]

"The Consumer Protection Board stepped in to help deal with the problem and brought the bill down to about Bt40,000. The ministry has been trying to protect tourists from scam artists," Kobkarn said.

The bill was still 40,000 Baht , what the <deleted> were they drinking and how long were they in there.

Probably they didnt know that the group of thai ladies around them where not sitting with them for free and every drink for them did cost 3x times more then theirs..

If it were in some establishments in Soho, London the ladies drinks would cost twenty times theirs.

[steven100]

Damn .... those pesky foreigners are at it again .... always complaining about one thing or another ... if there not getting ripped of by a jet ski show it's those bloody karaoke bars in Chiang Mai again ...

If them pesky tourists would just accept that thailand wants to scam you all then it wouldn't be a problem .....

oh my .... we just wanna scam you all ""

[Andrew65]

For those members who feel they have suggestions for the minister, here are contact details from the website.

I am sure they will appreciate farang suggestions, as they always do.

Office of the Minister

โทรศัพท์สายตรง : 0-2356-0703

โทรศัพท์ภายใน : 1550

E - Mail : [email protected]

So now ThaiVisa will send an email on behalf of its members enquiring about why the Jetski scam is allowed to continue???

Oh look a whole squadron of flying pigs!!!

The jet ski scam has been raised over and over for years on years by so many people including foreign governments and nothing has been done. Thai's just bare thier naked butt in the faces of foreigners and laugh. Nothing will ever change.

I was first in Thailand in 1985, there were warnings about the jet-ski scam then, so that has been going on for at least thirty years.

[Larry001]

At least a dozen regular scam artists near my workplace

in Bangkok every day of the week. Same faces for years.

All right under the nose of the local police station and

nothing has ever been done about it . . . and likely never

will.

Sir; how can you expect the RTP to do anything about these scam artists? They are already so busy talking on their mobile phones or eating. Please give them a break

[Larry001]

"The Consumer Protection Board stepped in to help deal with the problem and brought the bill down to about Bt40,000. The ministry has been trying to protect tourists from scam artists," Kobkarn said.

The bill was still 40,000 Baht , what the <deleted> were they drinking and how long were they in there.

Probably they didnt know that the group of thai ladies around them where not sitting with them for free and every drink for them did cost 3x times more then theirs..

If it were in some establishments in Soho, London the ladies drinks would cost twenty times theirs.

Irrelevant comment; they are not in Soho. They are in Thailand where drinks are a lot cheaper.

[Nowisee]

More and more I'm thinking thailand is not the place to retire and I wonder if it's even a place to vacation for 3 months or more... there are many other places one can go and NOT be scammed by the immigration or police so openly... AND have real beauty.

It really is sad that so many thai's don't see what this is going to do (eventually) to their country's name, not to mention the economy.

I am being barraged by so many negative reports (mostly on this site) and with my own experience at immigration... having just renewed my 1 year extension of stay and getting a multiple reentry permit (took me from 515am until 330pm.
This year I will seriously evaluate if I want to consider to keep doing this monkey dance. The only thing I will really miss is seeing and hanging out with the thai's in the countryside villages where I prefer to be. CM is turning into a real mess.

[thailandchilli]

It is not just the Thais who rip off tourists and visitoes

Try this guy for someone who is all by himself trying to undermine confidence in people booking stuff in Thailand

http://www.jermaineholliehead.com/

What a really nice guy!!

I've heard of this guy, a couple of my clients have mentioned him, agree its not only the Thai's you have to be wary of although theirs more of them to worry about!!

Tourists Are Reporting a Dramatic Surge in Harassment by Thai Police

The victims have little recourse when reporting incidents to the police, because the perpetrators are police officers. http://time.com/3674200/thailand-tourism-police-corruption-shakedown-extortion/

[Tokay]

TIME to be banned soon?

[BKKdreaming]

Lets get real on this........99.999% of the time its a small amount compared to the Airfare and Hotel costs

And I am sure that all the 3rd world Asian countries have tourist scams too ,

Thailand just seems to have better scams than the others

But also if you do your homework before leaving your comfy home you will know most of them and can avoid ,

Maybe Thai Visa needs to do a Sticky or an APP in the travel section pointing out the major scams and some of the unique ones !

[chotthee]

It is not just the Thais who rip off tourists and visitoes

Try this guy for someone who is all by himself trying to undermine confidence in people booking stuff in Thailand

http://www.jermaineholliehead.com/

What a really nice guy!!

I've heard of this guy, a couple of my clients have mentioned him, agree its not only the Thai's you have to be wary of although theirs more of them to worry about!!

Tourists Are Reporting a Dramatic Surge in Harassment by Thai Police

The victims have little recourse when reporting incidents to the police, because the perpetrators are police officers. http://time.com/3674200/thailand-tourism-police-corruption-shakedown-extortion/

I once bump into a few men in uniform. Their Thai was really bad. I think they are aliens, most likely from Burma or Khmer.

[BernieOnTour]

If they would be as stringent with customer protection as they are with "crimes" against the Computer Protection Act or "defamation" charges, the scams would stop within 1 week....

[Whyamiandwhatamidoinghere]

Japanese tourists recently posted a complaint on social media saying that cabbies based in Survarnabhumi Airport demanded ridiculous amounts for taking them to the center of Bangkok.

This complaint spread quickly through social media, with tourists lamenting the bad behavior of local cabbies.

"The ministry will work with the Transport Ministry, the airport authorities and the taxi group to ease this problem," the minister said.

This problem has been solved since then, with authorities setting up automatic queue-card taxi kiosks.

The hell it has. Got in a taxi at suvanabhumi at 11am to bangna. The taxi said no meter and I pay 700 baht which he said includes two toll fees. I refused. We were only 100meters away from the taxi queue. He then turn on the meter but made to unnecessary exits and what would have normally been 390 turn to be 590. Didn't the Pm say he would solve taxi scams 6 months ago?

[Whyamiandwhatamidoinghere]

Japanese always overpay whether it's for a taxi ride or a Beaver ride. And 40,000 baht for 4 hours of karaoke is still too much. They should have not had to pay 1 baht. The scammers should get nothing as punishment.

[Gutterboy]

news

njuːz/

noun

newly received or noteworthy information, especially about recent events.

[Dumu Ali]

and it seems that we are over with the real stuff and this is a declaration that witch hunting season is now open

[Old Man River]

Aaawww ... poor babies don't like the truth getting out about the real "Thainess" ... with the explosion in recent years of social media and people publicly (in reviews, blogs, forums, facebook etc) being able to vent their frustrations, the Thai's are somewhat lacking when it comes to accepting and actually dealing with the criticism and complaints and the fact that they are far from perfect and perhaps they actually need to fix things properly instead of just saying they will do something.

One day they'll realize that "foreigners" aren't stupid (on the whole) and "we" don't (generally) just take it up the < profanity removed > and say nothing about it. And the effects of this are being seen here more and more, day by day. Yes, people will "always" come here, but those numbers are dropping off a lot, and those that do come here and encounter these many scams, problems and issues WILL say something about it, won't come back, and neither will their friends, families or anyone else who reads about the numerous negative things about Thailand.

The day they realize this however is a long, long way away.

The fact that they can always blame things on other foreigners makes it easier to accept - it wasn't us so it must be them.

[German Viking]

"The Consumer Protection Board stepped in to help deal with the problem and brought the bill down to about Bt40,000. The ministry has been trying to protect tourists from scam artists," Kobkarn said.

The bill was still 40,000 Baht , what the <deleted> were they drinking and how long were they in there.

I guess, there was some extra charge for pussy playing involved or so!!???

[German Viking]

Damn foreigners. If they didn't complain then we wouldn't have these problems. Don't they understand Thainess? It's our country and you must accept that this is the way it is here. Curse you foreigners.

Damn posters who can't read. This is exactly the opposite of what the report actually said...

"Tourism and Sports Minister Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul said yesterday that she acknowledged all the problems and promised to deal with the issues."

Yeah, but she also said this

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/774310-foreign-tourists-can-be-assured-of-safety-in-thailand-says-kobkarn/

Which is pretty much the opposite as well.

An ex german Bundeskanzler "Konrad Adenauer" after a Journalist in a press conference told him, that he told a day before, just the opposite what he said today.

Answer: "I'm not interested in my speech of yesterday".

As long I remember Winston Churchill used sometimes similar phrases too.

In general nothing new, about politcians, after they are elected, they all getting more or less a kind of amnesia.

[German Viking]

"Reports of foreign tourists being ripped off by locals are destroying the image of the Thai tourism industry,"

Those who make these reports should be sent to the re-education camps! IMMEDIATELY!!!

Yes, I agree we just need somebody who enforce it, maybe we need a new Mao Tse Tung.

"Armament is an important factor in war, but not the decisive factor . . . Men, not materials, forms the decisive factor".

Mao Tse Tung

He would clean up LOS from all these bandits, but for an high price loss of freedom.

Ok 1 more.

"Weapons creates power, but you can only change the world with the help of weapons".

Mao Tse Tung

"Violence produce more violence" Georges Danton French Revolution 1789

His was executed as conspirator 1794, caused he tried to stop the violence.

[German Viking]

"Meanwhile, over the weekend, a troupe of Malaysian tourists in Chiang Mai posted a complaint on social media saying they were given a bill of Bt150,000 for a four-hour karaoke session.

The Consumer Protection Board stepped in to help deal with the problem and brought the bill down to about Bt40,000. The ministry has been trying to protect tourists from scam artists," Kobkarn said."

That's not solving the problem at all. They were still scammed, albeit for a lesser amount.

They should not have had to pay anything like that.

And what the hell is a "troupe" of tourists?

It's just pidgin english, I guess he meant troop.

[German Viking]

Luckily I live here long enough and my Thai is at least good enough to get around and make scammers back-off quickly in most (though not all) cases , but sad to say I consider Thailand now the world's SCAM HOTSPOT number 1 ( with neighboring Cambodia winning the runners-up title). And as I am involved in tourism and hospitality business and have been to 4 continents and numerous countries in the past 18 months, dare I say I can judge it somehow.....

the problem is, once you cut one arm of the giant Octopus of greedyness, two new arms will quickly grow out of it to fill the gap.....

I greek mythology called this animal "Hydra".

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/Hercules_slaying_the_Hydra.jpg

Herakles had real problems to kill this animal, but he had a solution, after cutting 1 head he burned the wound out, that no new head could growing again, but I think it is not that easy today, but the general idea is not bad, the question is who will enforce it!!???

[German Viking]

All Talk, no action. If the minister is serious, she would have ordered the closure of the OK bar in Chiang Mai in which the Dutch guy was bashed and the Malaysians were ripped off. Has she done that? Of course not ...because it's probably owned by some sleazebag hiso or wealthy creep. This govt is no more serious about ending scams than the last one or the one before that.

my guess would be it is owned by a senior cop and or local red mafia thug

I guess both parties involved as usual.