What to do
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Use the licence category that answers your question
The Bank of Thailand says foreign-exchange transactions should be conducted with people or businesses granted the relevant foreign-exchange licence. For an exchange booth that buys or sells physical foreign currency notes, the useful category is the authorized money changer. BOT defines that category narrowly as a licensed non-bank company buying and selling foreign banknotes.
Keep that scope in view. A money-changer listing is not evidence that the same business may offer remittance, cryptocurrency, every kind of foreign-exchange service or any service beyond the licence category shown. Verify the service you actually plan to use instead of extending one authorization to a different product.
Start from the current BOT lookup
Open the Bank of Thailand's authorized-money-changer page and use its current lookup or list. Do not treat a map pin, review site, social-media account, storefront photo or an old screenshot of a registry result as the controlling record. Those items may help identify a place, but they do not replace the live official source.
Copy the business name exactly as it appears in the BOT result. If the official entry shows additional identifying information, compare that information too. Similar English spellings, shared brand words or a familiar-looking sign are not an exact legal-entity match.
Match the entity to the place in front of you
Compare the displayed legal entity with the name presented at the booth or counter. When branch or address information is available, check that as well. A listed company name on its own does not establish that every shop using a similar name, logo or color scheme belongs to that company.
If you cannot connect the exact storefront to the exact official entry, keep the result unresolved. Ask the business for the legal name or branch information needed to perform the match, then repeat the official lookup. Do not substitute confidence in the brand for a matching record.
Read a positive result narrowly
A matching BOT record answers an authorization question about the legal entity and the banknote-changing category. It does not confirm today's opening hours, which currencies are available, how much cash the booth holds, the exchange rate being offered or whether staff will accept a particular note or transaction.
Those practical details have to be checked separately at the time of the exchange. Keep any rate comparison separate from the licence check: a favorable rate is not proof of authorization, and authorization is not a promise that one rate is better than another.
Treat missing or unclear matches as unresolved
No clear match does not explain the reason. The conclusion is only that you have not verified the exact entity through the current authorized-money-changer source. Do not turn an absent or ambiguous result into a claim about the business that the registry itself does not make.
Repeat the search using the exact legal name supplied by the business. If the entity, branch relationship or licence category still cannot be matched, do not describe the booth as BOT-authorized on the strength of signage, a receipt, a review or another person's past transaction.
Evidence
Sources
2 dated records support the material facts on this page.
- Foreign Exchange Business (opens in a new tab)
Bank of Thailandofficial governmentChecked