Every foreign tourist to Thailand set to be charged 100 baht insurance fee

[TigerandDog]

4 hours ago, madmitch said:

This idea has beem mooted before. It should work fine, depending upon how it's collected. I would guess the most logical way would be for an additional 100 baht tax on air tickets into Thailand. and the amount should only be used as a last resort and not replace proper travel insurance. This would of course mean that not only tourists are paying but also Thais travelling overseas and expats but this additional would make up the shortfall from those entering overland woudn't pay.

 

But who knows? The combined brain power of the Ministry of Tourism will no doubt come up with a much more convoluted system.

Once again comments based on absolute rubbish and speculation. 5 or 6 years it was made compulsory for ALL tourists to have travel insurance. As I previously posted, you had to show proof of travel insurance when passing through immigration. If you did not have TI, then you would be given 2 options, buy insurance on the spot or be denied entry. As usual the Thai authorities brought in a mandatory requirement but FAILED to actually enforce. They don't need to have any kind of surcharge for TI, they only need to enforce their existing mandatory requirements.

[Percy P]

2 minutes ago, potless said:

Or charge everyone 100 baht.

Together with the departure charge of 700 Baht.

[Percy P]

8 minutes ago, potless said:

Or charge everyone 100 baht.

Together with the 700 Baht Airport departure fee.

[TKDfella]

I wonder what it will say on the receipt? Well, that is, if tourists get one., ha!

[metisdead]

Off topic posts and replies have been removed. 

[ttrd]

4 hours ago, Mango Bob said:

So they are looking to make a profit out of this.

Yeah, 30m tourists/year (30mx100) gives 3 billion/thb - and around 10% is estimated to be used so yes a significant profit.

 

RE - Whether Thailand would adopt a charge for tourists coming in or leaving was still to be decided. 

 

So if charged when leaving it will be interesting to know how those who died will pay the fee ...

[potless]

2 minutes ago, Percy P said:

Together with the 700 Baht Airport departure fee.

A genuine question. Can you please help me to understand what the connection is between the 700 baht departure tax and the 100 baht for unpaid hospital bills ? 

[Tony125]

4 hours ago, Peterbilt said:

Only 100 BHT?
Come on Generals, you can do much better!
A lousy 3.8 bn BHT won't cover everything caused by those evil aliens who dare to get sick / injured or even die in the land of premium quality tourism.
Set it to 1,000 BHT with yearly increases of 200 BHT to compensate the always rising costs in the medical sector.

They read these forums , don't give them any ideas !  I think 150 ---300 baht would be fair . Profit could be used to send those in overstay jail home

[brianthainess]

So they can go to any hospital and receive free treatment. 

[terminatorchiangmai]

Mandatory insurance for Travel agents / tourist attractions cost max 25 baht per day and covers 500.000 in accidents and 1.000.000 in case of death or staying disabled.

Thailand is already a La La land so they should make mandatory insurance for all visitors because many tour operators not do.

TAT don't care if you make insurance for 100 people but process 3.000 a year, they only want to see a contract with minimum 6 months left on it.

[ocddave]

4 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

Let's see... 300 million a year in unpaid hospital bills... (maybe!)

 

vs potentially 3.8 billion in revenues from the proposed tourist tax

 

Oh look, 3.5 Billion baht in corruption looking for a place to happen.....I can just imagine the line waiting at this trough.....Amazing Thailand, more like Predictable Thailand, money is their God.

[Suradit69]

4 hours ago, trainman34014 said:

300 million baht a year ?  Another number from the Thai number factory, where any number that sounds big enough will do !

Less than US$ 10 million a year is hardly unbelievable. There have been numerous reports of individuals running up charges of around Baht 1 million and undoubtedly many unreported smaller amounts. Aside from tourists who seem to be accident prone, many elderly retirees require lengthy, expensive stays in hospital but have no financial resources.

 

The amounts of unpaid medical services bills have been reported often over the years.  As far as government statistics go (any government's) these seem to be easily reasonable.

 

On the other hand your knee jerk reaction was hardly the result of hours of research.

 

Currently unpaid hospital bills mean that those of us who do pay our bills are charged more to cover the losses created by others.

 

On 5/15/2019 at 6:44 AM, webfact said:

According to a straw poll on the Thaivisa Facebook page, which at the time of publishing had received over 3,000 votes, 69 percent of respondents voted ‘Yes’ when asked “do you think foreigners aged over 50 should be required to have health insurance in order to stay in Thailand?”

 

 

 

[harleyclarkey]

Are my maths correct?

38 million tourists grace Thailand with their choice of destination and spend their money.

Let's say each spends B5,000 per day (https://www.rvo.nl/sites/default/files/2017/06/factsheet-toerisme-in-thailand.pdf).....or 50,000 Baht for a 10-day stay.

 

This is a spend of 1.9 TRILLION Baht (estimate for 2019 is 2.21 Trillion!) and they cost the Thais a miserly 300 million Baht. 

 

Get real Thailand....or maybe you just have it far too easy. Or would I be too much of a sceptic to think the 3.8 Billion Baht in the insurance take is actually for other pockets?

[Orton Rd]

Not much more than a scam, does anybody really thing they will be forking about about one million baht to have the very ill and bodies sent back home?

[dallen52]

4 hours ago, Pilotman said:

what a good idea.  No, I'm not being sarcastic. 

Agree.

It's like £2 or $5 Australian. 

Should be mandatory for some regulated cover for everyone. 

We could at least fall back on the 30 baht scheme that the Thais use in public hospital. 

(My last visit to Pattaya Public hospital required me to put 50,000 baht cash down, before admission)

 

The next gripe will be tourists using the Thai public hospital system.

Even though they are insured...

[GalaxyMan]

4 hours ago, madmitch said:

I would guess the most logical way would be for an additional 100 baht tax on air tickets into Thailand.

Why only air travelers? It should apply to everybody entering the country, no matter where or how they do so. I think it's a great idea, assuming they actually use the money as they're supposed to.

[kevin612]

Okay, you need to give us cheap health insurance in return.

[Changbeer4me]

4 hours ago, JohnOFphon said:

Didn't there used to be a departure tax? I remember going to a machine and paying 500 bt for a ticket that had to be shown,,,at check in or passport control...don't remember which.

Yeah It was put into ticket prices

so they already getting 500 and now

want more as price not been settled

on yet.

 

It was a pain to remember to have the 500 baht set aside.   Many got caught out. 

 

Strange the media did not report that part of story.   

 

Changbeer4me

[Jimbo2014]

Gosh I wonder if that money will ever reach a hospital.  Here is an idea.  Stop killing or injuring so many tourists.  Put the money towards the safety of the beaches and roads!

 

[bluesofa]

Just now, Jimbo2014 said:

Gosh I wonder if that money will ever reach a hospital.  Here is an idea.  Stop killing or injuring so many tourists.  Put the money towards the safety of the beaches and roads!

Just stop it! You're using logic again, it'll never catch on here.

[PerkinsCuthbert]

5 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

Let's see... 300 million a year in unpaid hospital bills... (maybe!)

 

vs potentially 3.8 billion in revenues from the proposed tourist tax

 

And what exactly kind of coverage are these Thailand travelers going to get for their 100 baht???

 

BTW, it doesn't seem to specify any particular kind of arrival/visa class... So presumably, either on entry or exit, they're planning to charge any and all foreigners, including long-term expats here who may already have insurance.... 

 

I didn't see any mention of any exemption for O-A visa holders who likely will be subject to the new and much more expensive insurance requirement of their own.  Or any plan to drop the O-A specific proposal in favor on this broader, more reasonably priced alternative.

 

The clue is in the word 'tourist' in the heading. 

[Davo369]

2 hours ago, recom273 said:

OMG .. I forgot about that! It was a nightmare trying to juggle your last nights finances to make sure you had enough for a taxi and departure tax. People used to wander around Don Muang trying to scrape enough for the machine (I think it was a machine, it was like more than 15 years ago) .. what a blast from the past. 

More than 15 years, I can remember 20 years ago for 500 bht tax

[ianezy0]

makes perfect sense.

[PerkinsCuthbert]

1 minute ago, Davo369 said:

More than 15 years, I can remember 20 years ago for 500 bht tax

Departure tax is almost universally levied, though as you say it is mostly accounted these days in the price of the ticket, rather than in a separate kiosk before immigration as it used to be - except in more backward countries.

Departure tax is justified as a charge for improvement and maintenance of air travel infrastructure, and as such is irrelevant to this new proposal, which is about health insurance - except insofar as you may choose to believe this charge too goes into the pockets of the wrong people - about which I couldn't possibly comment.

[justin case]

"This, they said, is costing the country 300 million baht a year. "

 

but now they expect to get 3.8 billion baht

 

and they still want to do insurance SCAM

 

why nobody of those asswipes came up with this idea decades ago

 

oh, I forgot, people already pay tax, calculated in the ticket

[jaiyen]

5 hours ago, JohnOFphon said:

Didn't there used to be a departure tax? I remember going to a machine and paying 500 bt for a ticket that had to be shown,,,at check in or passport control...don't remember which.

It went up to 700 baht in the end and is now included in your ticket price.

 

[Pilotman]

34 minutes ago, harleyclarkey said:

Are my maths correct?

38 million tourists grace Thailand with their choice of destination and spend their money.

Let's say each spends B5,000 per day (https://www.rvo.nl/sites/default/files/2017/06/factsheet-toerisme-in-thailand.pdf).....or 50,000 Baht for a 10-day stay.

 

This is a spend of 1.9 TRILLION Baht (estimate for 2019 is 2.21 Trillion!) and they cost the Thais a miserly 300 million Baht. 

 

Get real Thailand....or maybe you just have it far too easy. Or would I be too much of a sceptic to think the 3.8 Billion Baht in the insurance take is actually for other pockets?

most of the tourists right now are Indian and Chinese,  Many are on pre- paid organised tours and won't spend anywhere near 5K a day. Too many western tourists are pitching up with no insurance and then acting like idiots, ( renting motorbikes without licence and no travel insurance) and then expect some 'Go Fund' process to bail them out when  it all goes wrong.  Good on the Thais for starting to tackle it.  

[DogNo1]

I think that the assumption that the 100 Baht insurance fee for all arriving tourists would somehow provide each of them a type of insurance policy is wrong.  It is likely that it will do no such thing.  The money is likely to be used to reimburse hospitals and other medical providers for the unpaid bills left by tourists and little else.   Tourists will probably still be responsible for paying for their own health care.

[xtrnuno41]

Well have another idea to add. Let all tourists pay CO2 tax.

WIth the 38 million visitors coming to Thailand, Thailand has an increasing CO2 problem.

All those people are exhaling CO2, so rises the CO2 exhaust in Thailand.  

AH , just googled it , many countries are working on that. 

[cardinalblue]

This pot of money will be ripe for corruption....

 

didnt know Thailand was paying for remains to be returned home...I wonder how they decide to fund who? Like death caused by another party at fault vs self demise?