Opening an office in Bangkok, Thailand

I thought I’d share some info and experiences with opening an office in Bangkok, Thailand. I opened an office here in 2005 and am just about to open up another.

• Registering a Thai limited company

Firstly, before you can open an office or advertise on the Thai employment web sites, you’ll need to register a Thai limited company. I highly recommend putting a lot of effort into researching this, as you’ll ideally want to stay with the same company for other business related admin stuff such as a business visa, work permit and taxes. I also recommend you go with a Thai run company rather than a foreign run company, simply because you’ll save around 60% on the admin costs.

The minimum requirement is 4 Thai staff per working foreigner in the Thai company. As a foreigner can only own 49% of the companies shares, so you will need Thai share holders added to the company … If you don’t know any Thai nationals that can help, the company registering your company may be able to provide share holders for a monthly fee. Basically, as long as you are the highest share holder within the company, you have the right to take other directors off and add new ones on at any time. The costs involved of registering a Thai company and a monthly accountant fee vary greatly between companies: you should be able to open up a Thai company for 30,000 to 50,000 baht, with a monthly account fee of 10,000B+

You also need invested capitol, I think the requirement is a few million baht… you don’t need the money sitting in the bank… you just need the money on paper – I’ve never really understood this… this is exactly why I pay an expert to sort this out for me, and highly recommend you do the same!

The company you appoint to work with setting all this up will also help you transfer your registered company to your new office address.

• Finding an office

Like any city, the rate for office space highly depends on where the office is located and how well the office building is kept. You can expect to pay anywhere from 450 to 700B per square meter within the business zones (Sathorn, Wireless Road, Chitlom, Lower Sukemvit and Silom) and from 200B per square meter on the out skirts of the city.

As most Thai’s do not drive in the city, it’s a wise move to have the office located near public transport, in particular the Skytrain. With Bangkok’s famous traffic jams, having your office located near a sky train station will make it very convenient for your staff and visiting clients.

It’s a lot easier finding an office if you know what area you want the office building to be in, if you don’t, this will involve many, many days viewing offices. Once you have an area in mind, it’s worth visiting the offices yourself and inquiring if they have any unites avalible. If your Thai language skills are limited, I recommend taking a Thai friend along with you to help translate.

Other options to help you locate an office include the national newspapers: The Bangkok Post and The Nation along with commercial real estate companies. One of the best commercial real estate agencies I have come across is Jones Lang Lasalle - They have a lot of listings on their books and the service is good too – I ended up renting both my offices through these guys.

• Negotiating lease terms and rates

The standard terms of contract include 2 months deposit with a month’s rental in advance, although these terms vary depending on the office management company. Also, contacts vary between 1 or 3 years. Most places are open to offers, but don’t count on huge discounts. Make sure you ask what condition the office will come in, what maintenance you’ll be responsible for, who will take care of the cleaning etc. Another important aspect you’ll want to find out is whether you can move into another unit in the same building if your company grows and you need space for more employees – One company said that I would loose my deposit if I rented another unit before my contract was to expire, so it’s asking before hand and add it within the terms of lease.

• Kitting out the office

I have searched many places in Bangkok for desks of different prices and quality. There were 2 areas I’d recommend people, one is Seacon Square shopping center – The whole 3^rd floor is has office and furniture shops, all are open to negotiations and offer free delivery within the main business districts. Another great shop, where I actually ended up buying my office furniture from was Index – They have a huge selections, ranging from 1,500B for a quality desk to 550,000B for the directors desk. Chairs vary from 1000B to 70,000B

Computers – I bought mine from Pantip Plaza, the huge computer mall here in Bangkok. If you have a wonder around, you’ll notice printed specs which you can take home and decide on what specs you need, most shops also have computers packages – where you basically get everything you need including the PC, flat screen monitor and the accessories such as mouse/keyboard/speakers in one. A typical set for 12,000B at the time of writing includes a Pentium 4 processor, 80g hard drive, 2 x 512RAM, 17” LCD and a few other bits to make it a complete PC.

This will differ between your requirements, for example, I’ll be employing programmers, so I’ll need extra umph in their machines plus 2 huge monitors… go down to Pantip and have a wonder around, some good deals to be had down there.

• Moving In

Most office management companies will give you 1 month extra ontop of the lease free, which is often described at the kitting out period. If you need maintenance work, most office building will be able to provide you contacts. Once you have got your keys and a month to get your office up to scratch, it’s worth using this time to find employees.

• Employing Staff

Here are some great web sites you can use to find staff. jobbkk.com, jobsdb.com, jobpub.com, jobbee.com and jobtopgun.com - I have tried a few of these and by far jobdb.com is the most busy, which means more possible options to choose from.Everyone has their own ways of dealing with interviews etc so I won’t tell you how to conduct yours.

Please, please don’t be another fool and advertise for Thai staff in the English language newspapers - I personally don’t know ANY Thai people who read the English newspapers! Advertising in the Thai newspapers is not only cheaper, but more targeted.

I’ll follow this post with 10 tips on how to manage Thai Staff There are 10 things I’ll be doing differently the 2^nd time around, so hopefully you won’t make the same mistakes I did. There not really mistakes, there just learning curves that will hopefully make me a better boss here in Thailand.

As always, if you have any questions, please leave them in the comments.