bureaucracy: or obstrocracy: will it ever improve?

[Lord Toad]

The paper-less office is thought to be the ideal situation in the modern business world. How ever as I posted in a thread about the police in Thailand the paper bureaucracy is here is horrendous. I just had to go to the local immigration office to get an exit visa. First you can not come here, then you have to leave every three months (minimum) and when you finally get a visa (retirement) that allows you to stay here all the time: you can not leave the country!

Anyway that is not the point of this post. Whilst playing with the petty bureaucrats that pose as immigration officers I could not but observe the piles and piles of paper that were being generated. As a friendly aside I suggested that the modern quest of a paperless office would simplify matters considerably. I am not sure that that remark helped my quest for rapid service: the usual bits of paper and several people stamping and generally fluffing about still prevailed. But as I drove home I could not but think that Thai bureaucracy: or should it be obstrocracy must amount to tree genocide.

The CEO keeps talking about modernizing the country: maybe this is a good place to start. I just hate to think how many pictures of me they must have. They even needed one today.

Is there any real attempt to try and breakdown this petty need for everything written and photocopied in several different ways. Is there ever going to be a rationalization of the paperwork to be replaced by computers?

[khunsanuk]

Hi,

 

LT, I would say that one of the main reasons they do now change is because they would not know what to do with all those government officials who would become totally useless.

They have 3-4 people doing what 1 person could easily do.

 

Sanuk!

[MrX]

Lord Toad!....bureaucracy is the spawning pool of corruption.....go figure!

[Grabii]

Toad,

 

For a moment I thought you might be talking about US immigration....

 

But anyway, the love of paper in Thailand is not limited to the government. It's pervasive throughout business as well. Ever notice how even in the modern department stores they ring you up on a cash register and also write out the purchase on a pad? (Almost like taking your order in a restaurant anywhere, but in the reverse order.)

 

The fancy bar I used to frequent most (Huay Kwang district) had a nice modern cash register system that tracked and tabulated an itemized bill. But at the end of the night the barmaid would take the duplicate copies of the origianl order sheets and, going through them one by one, manually filled out a list that recorded the number of each type of drink served that night - something that the register system should easily have been able to spit out.

 

In the bank where I cashed checks and exchanged currency every transaction was recorded twice - once on the computer and then separately in a written log.

 

I think this refusal to make use of electronic capabilities to replace manual labor is one reason that Thailand has a relatively low unemployment rate. Perhaps they buy the electronic equipment to look good and modern, but they just can't break the habits of the old ways of doing things.

 

Grabii

[gomez]

There is too much paper. I don't know why my employer a few months ago asked for 48 pictures (24, 12 and 12 of different sizes), though last time the pile lasted a few years.

 

Lots of bureaucracy.

 

But no stress.

 

Thais visiting my country or trying to immigrate there face less paper, fewer pictures, but much more stress, and must spend a great deal of time being interviewed and belittled.

 

And they face a much greater risk of being refused, or sent home after they get there.

 

Thailand is heaven, with a bit of a paperwork problem.