Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the issue of tax as it pertains to the possibility of seeing amendments to the tax code here in Thailand. Now I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Pattaya Mail, that is pattayamail.com, the article is titled: Expat dream shattered in Thailand: cockup, conspiracy or just plain nonsense? And the writer of this article, Mr. Barry Kenyon, hats off to you sir. He's a friendly acquaintance of mine, I dare say I'd call him a friend. We have hung out from time to time and discussed issues associated with Thai Immigration. He's one of these old timers if I may, who has been around quite a while, and frankly he has in many cases more insight into the underlying policy thinking of Immigration than I do, and I'll be the first to admit that, especially down there in Pattaya. He's got a good finger on the pulse with regard to how things work down in Pattaya.

That said, this article pertains, or this video pertains to the issue of tax and tax policy. As I discussed in other videos, unfortunately there are a lot of for lack of a better term, ne'er do wells and frankly folks and charlatans who really shouldn't be discussing tax matters at all who are coming in and discussing matters pertaining to Thai Tax Policy including assessability and liability for tax here in Thailand, frankly when they shouldn't and oftentimes they seem to be trying to scare monger people into rustling up work to file tax documentation that oftentimes folks don't necessarily need. 

I get into deeper analysis in that kind of stuff in our currently new Integrity News Service. Those who are interested in further deep dives into this stuff and how it sort of pertains to expats, please feel free to email us, [email protected] and we can talk to you about our payment service in the terms associated therewith. While I'm talking about that just here for a moment, bear with me. I would like to say yeah, I have opened a new restaurant here in downtown Bangkok. It's called Pancake Palace. It is kind of American diner style food. As the name suggests, it's breakfast anytime, but again we also have pancakes obviously, we also have great American diner style food; we have glass bottled Coke, we also have hamburgers, cheeseburgers, we've got chilli bowls and we have got buffalo wings - in my opinion, best buffalo wings in Thailand. Folks who are interested in that kind of food might want to check us out. 

Rounding back to this tax issue, again from Pattaya Mail, pattayamail.com, quoting directly: "Income tax is punitive. Currently, the Thai Finance Ministry is submitting a new amendment that oversees income transferred here will be tax-free in the year of submission or the following one." So as we discussed, there was a memorandum which was promulgated and published back in quarter three of 2023 which got into the whole issue of timing of remittances inbound to Thailand for purposes of assessability. Prior to January 1, 2024, any remittance inbound to Thailand where the source of the remittance was accrued in the prior calendar year to the year that it was remitted into Thailand was not assessable for tax purposes. Following the promulgation of that memorandum, starting January 1, 2024, that changed; they started being able to assess funds coming in regardless of the timing of accrual versus remittance. Now again, assessability does not necessarily mean liability. As I have discussed in other videos, unfortunately a ton of hyperbole got spun up about this and basically people were trying to create an industry and filing taxes and stuff for expats here in Thailand and frankly most of them are especially the foreigners were operating illegally because tax matters and advice and consultation regarding Thai Tax issues are within the exclusive bailiwick of Thai nationals only. 

But going back to the issue itself, it scared up a lot of people. There were situations where yeah, the underlying facts in a given case might lead to the situation where you owe taxes for money if you remitted funds into Thailand. Again it depended on the nature of the funds, it still does. 

Apparently, the Finance Ministry is talking about doing a new memorandum which would sort of reverse all of that and that is what Mr. Kenyon is talking about here. Let me quote further: "But of course, the conspiracy theorists will quote an unnamed policeman who says it's all a temporary ruse to grab your cash. The whole debate about expats, especially retirees, and their cash has become both exaggerated and distorted over the past two years." Yeah, I couldn't have put that better myself. It has become exaggerated and distorted over the past two years. Meanwhile this talk of a new amendment, I have been hearing about this for weeks. We have yet to see it. I think it would be a good idea. Frankly I think it would be a good idea to just rescind the original memorandum, reissue it and make it narrowly tailored frankly to corporate interests and basically exempt if you will or just not mentioned individuals. That would be in my opinion a better way to handle all that because who they were targeting was basically Branch Offices of Thai corporations remitting funds back into Thailand. It really wasn't ever in my opinion intended to target individuals, but individuals here in Thailand who wanted to make some money I think got a hold of that, spun it up and then created this whole, I don't know what you want to call it, cacophony that basically said, "oh you have got to get your Tax ID filed here in Thailand", and in many cases it is unnecessary or in many cases may be detrimental depending on your circumstances. 

So the thing to take away from this video and understand is it does appear the Finance Ministry is weighing the idea of releasing some sort of new memorandum; I have heard it talked about now for a number of weeks. Whether or not that comes to pass remains to be seen, but we will certainly keep you updated on this channel as the situation evolves.