Transcript of the above video: 

I am really not particularly happy to be making this video, but it's warranted. In the past week or so I just got a number of emails, and you know what, there's a certain point where it's like, I think it's just reasonable that some statements be made. How about that? First of all, reason for the thumbnail. One of my all-time favourite films - we're coming off the Christmas season here - Bad Santa with Billy Bob Thornton, we've edited it for sort of broad audience but, "I wear this f-ing thing as a fashion statement, all right?" The point is there is a great scene in Bad Santa where it says - it's a little kid talking to a Billy Bob Thornton, and it's an adult film, okay, understand that, but it is funny - and the part where he said, "oh you're Santa?" And he says, "no, I wear this thing as a fashion statement." The point is he's kind of hacked off and not rightly so. In the movie he's a ne'er do well safe cracker playing Santa in order to basically put himself in the position to be able to crack safes at holiday time. But it is a funny movie; it's worth a watch. But his attitude, just the overall like just completely exasperated, just tired of it; that is kind of how I feel right now. I've received in the past week, a half a dozen of these emails like this, and it makes me wonder about a lot of things and I'll get into it here in a moment. 

That said, look people contact us and we send back usually a response - not all the time - it depends on the facts in the given case how we respond to different inquiries, but we do receive a number of relatively similar inquiries, and we have various responses albeit they are specifically crafted to the person that we are talking to. My girls and myself here on the information desk do actually process these email inquiries and that is the best way to contact us by the way is by email. I get a lot of people that say, "hey we tried to call." Yeah, our phones are constantly in use and if you call through, I disabled voicemail years ago. It was counterproductive. People would leave all these voicemails; we would have to sit around and listen to it and then try to get back to people and then it's hard to figure out who's a client, who is not. It just ended up being easier, we have basically call waiting, so the next person is available to answer phone calls will, but if we're already on the line, yeah we're just already on the line and it may just ring and you may not get an answer. The best way to contact us is through email. 

Now that said, I've got a number, I've got like a half a dozen of these in like the last 5 days. So it's, I don't know what it is, I don't know if it's high season, we've got all these people coming in here that have completely out of whack expectations for how things work but the reason for the title is look, we get paid for legal services and the quote is actually from Abraham Lincoln, A Lawyer's Time and Advice is his Stock in Trade. Well that's a law firm's stock in trade as well and yes we do initially communicate. We advise what we can do for folks but generally speaking, if you want to go ahead and start using our services, we basically will set up a paid consultation. That money from that initial paid consultation can be credited to further work you opt to undertake with our firm, but yeah, we need to get at least some sort of token remuneration for doing our job, okay. I think that's important to point out. It is our job to provide legal services and assistance. Let's also point out, I've been doing this channel - it will be 10 years in October, going back to 2016 - I've been making the videos on this channel. It's not monetized. I do understand it is promotional in nature. That was the reason for it, but I've given away a lot of information, and I've given out a lot of free advice over a decade and nearly 8,500 videos in my time. So when I get these really nasty emails back for, oh I don't know, the affrontery of wanting to be paid for our services, it gets galling and I think it's worth reading some of these recent responses after folks, we give them0 the terms of our service and say, "hey you need to go ahead and pay and we can go ahead and get you into the office and we will credit that initial payment to any further work," and I get stuff like, quote: "I was hoping to get some kind of broad analysis of the scope of this project legally speaking." Yeah, that's what we get paid to do. Quoting further: "None of my questions were addressed" - because you haven't paid anything yet - "and before I move forward and start paying a lawyer, I would like some kind of consultation." Well you can like in one hand, and crap in the other and see which one you're going to get, at least from me. Quoting further: "Considering these are your areas of expertise, certainly there must be some kind of estimate regarding the scope of these services?" Yes, there would be, after we do the analysis of the facts of your case, analyze what the options are, and then yes, we can provide quotations for those options. Quoting further: "I can't afford to pay a law firm tons of money to only find out I am not protected in Thailand." Well let me let you in on a little secret. You're not a Thai and if you're not a Thai, guess what? The name is on the door: Thailand. You are probably not going to have the same privileges and immunities as do Thai citizens; so that's just a place to start from. And oh, by the way. Yes, lawyers do get paid to tell you "no" sometimes. Just the mentality behind this just boggles my mind. This is akin to saying "well I'm not going to pay a doctor, if he's going to diagnose me with a disease. I don't want that." Huh? Then I got another one of these. So this is the second response. "You want me to give you $167?" - Well actually no; we charge in Baht - Quoting further: "before I even meet you? I've been following you on YouTube for a few years, but I still don't know you well enough to just trust you completely. I think there must be a misunderstanding." Yes, there is a misunderstanding. Again, I'm putting this stuff out there for free. And you know what? Before you start saying it's purely promotional, I was the one that told people that the Income Affidavit for Retirement Visas was going away; I was the one that warned people about insurance requirements coming online; I was the one that warned people about how things were changing with regard to COVID for months on end. I was the one that told people when USCIS closed here locally. I'm not getting paid for these videos. Yes, I make them for a promotional purpose, so as to attract people to the firm, to pay us for our services. Narrowly tailored legal advice for individuals is exactly what our services entail. I have got another one. This one was a real doozy. "Please forward this response to your Managing Director," - and bear in mind, the information desk answers this stuff. I don't see all of these other than when they sort of chime into me here in the office and they say, "hey we have got an inquiry on this; it's a little different than sort of standard inquiries, what's your thoughts boss?" and I may chine in on them and then they include it in the response. But again no, this is why this person saying, "please forward this." Okay, it's been forwarded. I'm now answering." Quoting further: "Please forward this response to your Managing Director, Benjamin W. Hart, so he understands the sort of feedback that potential clients are giving in response to email inquiries. I expect a direct response from him and him alone." Well here I am. Quoting further: "The response you have given me indicates that I should never ever use Integrity Legal for any service! The terrible use of legalese to try to justify an excessive payment," - who says it is excessive? My rates are half of what you pay for an Attorney back in the United States and I do some of the most specialized legal work on the face of the planet. Do you know a guy that knows how to do specialized US Immigration including Waiver work who can also do Thai Immigration and is a naturalized Thai? Are we just falling off of trees out there? - "Excessive payment for a "service" which was not asked for." You inquired regarding legal information. That's exactly what was asked for. Quoting further: "In order to answer a "very simple" yes, no question is absolutely ridiculous." Answering your yes and no questions is exactly my job, and I expect to be paid to do it. I'm sick and tired of hearing that, "oh it's just a few questions." That’s exactly what lawyers are paid to do. To answer a few questions. You know what? Frankly I would appreciate not having to do it under this level of duress, and just constant nanny-minding, nit picketing - it's not even criticism, it's just insulting - for somebody that just wants to do their job. Quoting further: "Especially as he basically answered the question on the YT (YouTube) video and I'm just confirming it." Huh? So the free information I gave you wasn't enough. You come in and you want it confirmed from legal sources, but you don't want to pay for that? Quoting further: quote: "impacted by the underlying facts, render opinions regarding the posture of your overall case, most often the ways to proceed. You're trying to talk to a real person, not convince a Judge." No, we're speaking to you with legal clarity regarding the terms and conditions of our service, Sir. And by the way, you wanted me alone, this is me alone. I'm answering your questions. Go away is also the response. We don't want you as a client around here. 

That said, here's another one, nice little doozy. So this person decided to insult me in one email, which I then responded back to and then he decided to come back at me. "I'm not willing to pay $170 for a consultation considering you haven't spelled out the cost of the other fees associated with obtaining the DTV Visa. I may or may not change my mind." Yet another reason I'm not thrilled by you DTV holders. If that's all you people are going to show. And by the way, thank you so much Shinawatras and Pheu Thai for foisting this boondoggle on this country. A bunch of people coming in here, going to be here for five years at a stretch, no particular reason for being here, not contributing anything to the country, not paying any taxes and now they don't want to pay for anything. Great. So I responded to that. My response was, "My staff has passed along your message. I get paid for my time and advice and fun fact, the DTV may not be optimal for you as it is an ad hoc creation of a government that just fell from power. But clearly you know more than I do, so go figure it out on your own." And then I blocked the person, because anytime we get these sort of responses and it comes through the info desk, the girls don't want to deal with it, I don't want to deal with it; we block them. Why do we want to hear this negativity from people? Just to do our jobs? Then this person comes back. "I figured for a punk who would send "block". I thought you were a dick head pussy that didn't know how to tie a tie. You have confirmed it." Neat. By the way, there are consequences at law in Thailand under the Computer Crimes Act for harassing people online. Something to point out in all of this. 

Look, I don't like making these videos, and to all of you people, including the folks that make up part of my audience, which I never thought in a million years I would have, and I'm eternally grateful for it, I'm not talking to you here. But you folks that think that everything supposed to be free or cheap or easy or whatever else you think coming to Thailand, you need to stop it. You're halfway around the world in a country where you don't speak the language, with a legal system you very much do not understand. Stop acting like you're entitled to something. If you would like legal services from our firm, we would be happy to offer them, but we have terms and conditions and we expect that our clients - prospective or otherwise - adhere to them.