I received two payments made by clients overseas on my kasikorn business account. On both occasions i got a phonecall from kasikorn asking me what the payments are for.

Is this something new? Never had that before. Is this a new rule by the BOT? Or is their suspicion towards foreigners doing business in Thailand reaching a new height?

 

unless you state what its for,normally you will get a call.i can go back 10yrs.ago when our house trans.cost was questioned.

even now they ask what its for[over a certain amount] 

Question: Was this from the U.S. or somewhere else?

 

The reason I aks is because the U.S. has bcome very susoicious about fund transfers to foriegn countries in the last few years

Ok, the reason was mentioned in the transfer.

The transfer came from Europe.

In these times it’s nothing unusual to be asked what a transfer is for.

 

For Thai banks I have only been questioned about amounts exceeding $50,000, but there could be other triggers. For European banks I have regularly been asked, even once when I sent money (to Thailand), the European bank called me up and asked for the reason and if they should expect similar in the future.

 

There is a lot of pressure on the banks to have “know your customer” procedures to prevent money laundering and funding of terrorist cells, which is what causes these minor annoyances. I must have talked with a dozen or so bank staffers about my money transfers, and I get the feeling that some of them are as annoyed about this as I am.

 

I also have bank dealings in the U.S., but never ever has there been a problem there, even though I am not a U.S. citizen and have probably transferred as much as half a million dollars in a single transaction. They are probably too busy imposing banking regulation on the rest of the world