EricV

Agree that would be a reasonable way to solve this, but I don't think people will get fired or arrested in Thailand over a little tea money in our life time...too many people are part of that collection pyramid...

I partially agree with that sentiment. I would never expect a regular Thai (or any other boat nationality) to speak my mother tongue or English. But I DO expect any business that caters to tourists to speak the language of their guests well, it's just good business sense. In many places, that means English, and increasingly in Asia that may mean. Mandarin. If you don't speak the language of the people you want to earn money from, it's just plain poor customer service and if you expect your customers to learn your language do buy from you, you are not likely to succeed... (national) pride can get into the way of good business... In my observation, people in hospitality in smaller countries tend to speak better English than in bigger (prouder, more nationalistic?) countries - Portugal better than Spain, Netherlands better than France and Cambodia or Laos better than Thailand. And over the last 10-15y in my opinion, English skills in Thailand hospitality have stagnated while they have improved greatly in Cambodia or Laos...

They had dispatchers for a while. Problem was, they were in cahoots with drivers, telling visitors there was a fixed fee of THB500 or more, which was defeating the purpose of the machines, tags, etc...

Here are three ways to do this: 1. Buy a refundable ticket for return flight & cancel if your plans change. 2. Buy the cheapest one-way ticket you can find. Use SkyScanner - it'll let you search for flights to "Everywhere" from BKK/DMK within a month, so you can get a ticket for a few bucks and just toss it...