I'm Currently living here on a multiple O visa with a wife and children.

I have a regular income form the UK

We want to start a local computer repair business.

What advice can people give me?

Do I have to create a thai company with 2 million baht and

have the 6 thai shareholders etc or is there an easier (read cheaper!) way of going about it.

Thanks in advance for your advice

Hi.

I have found this website quite usefull giving an indication of costs of setting up businesses. It also details the different businesses and requirements.

Thailand business and investment

As for the 2 million baht. I have been told by Thai accountants that proof of this is only required at the end of the the tax year. (I myself would appreciate confirmation on this).

The best advice I can give you is to never trust your accountant.  Make sure you have an external auditor and if possible an internal auditor.  Change the external auditor every couple of years or so.  Also make sure you check out your customers as far as possible to make sure that they can pay, and that they are likely to pay as much on time as possible.  Be very careful if you are doing work for a large company owned by (I won't say in this post) because if you are the small guy, sooner or later you may be owed so much that you cannot survive without payment, and you may never get paid.  Keep up with the financial condition of your customers, because if you see them getting in trouble, you can cut your losses.  There's more, but not for public posting. If interested email me with your private email address and I will explain more.

7 natural persona are needed as shareholder to incorporate private limited comnpnay and in case of foreigner participation no more than 3 shall foreigner and the rest Thai national. In your case you need another six Thai and may include your wife and her relative and friends to meet the minimium of  7 share holder to form the company.You may hold less than 49% share in the capitla equity but you may be the sole authorised signatory ( or Director ) to run day to day management of the company.You have to apply for company Income Tax Card, V.A.T.Card and Work Permit & Non ( Visa to legally run your company and business here.Without company registration document, ( Memorandum & Articles of Associaiton ) Tax Cards, and Non (, work permit application could not proceed ( Off course there are other document and papers to provide too ).This is very important initial paper to secure for running business here by Alien.

Lincoln it used to be 4 Thai for a Limited company. Now its just 1 Thai required but still holding 51% of the shares. This is in normal situations. IN BOI, Amity and most manufacturing companies no Thai shareholders are required.

What is the criteria for no Thai shareholders? Can a non-american farang hold 100%????

ThaiAdventure, Yes, if your company is BOI sponsored/approved, a non-american farang can own 100%.

Check the BOI site: http://www.boi.go.th/

You can do a search on the list of Company sponsored by BOI, available on the web site.

It is a repair shop...forget BOI

My business is not a repair shop. It's engineering.

I have looked at the site and it seems that it takes a long time (>60 days) to apply. Does this mean that you cannot initially form the company with BOI approval? Rather, you have to apply after formation? In addition, the application form asks for a list of promoters and share info which I will not have until I have formed the comapany.

I tried doing a search in the company list under (comapany, formation, start-up etc but got no listings. Can you give me clue as to what to search for to get company formation agencies?

You have to form a company and then apply for BOI. The risk is that if you base your expectations and business plan on getting the BOI approval, and are rejected, you will have spent a bunch of extra time and money for nothing.  

In Thailand, it is mainly lawyers and some accounting firms that do the company formations.  So look for law firms and accounting firms, then see if they offer company formation services, contact them for fees and as much info as they will give you free, and see if you can put any of them on a minimum retainer until you are ready to make your move.

"computer repair business"   why not shorten the process and check with the BOI. It is a domestic business for mine there's no hope.