Alternatives to poipet border
 

Hi all,
In siem reap tonight and am planning to cross tomorrow... hoping to get to Bangkok...

All my paperwork is ok with Carnet etc... (although i didnt purchase insurace for Cambodia, was only here for like 4 nights and didnt get around to it)

Ive heard nightmare stories for Poipet... What is the alternative borders from here... my the way not on a bike but my mitsu delica

Cheers all

furthermore... i do realise technically carnets are not used in thailandd... but its their just in case...
given that I want to get to BK or close enough too... Do i have no other choice but to go through poipet

where does the grief start... Cambodia side or thai side....any recent first hand experience....

No recent experience, last one for me was in -07..but there should be at least two crossings further south. One west from Pailin, and also near the coast at Koh Kong, though that's a long detour. Poipet appeared to me like a s###hole, I'd probably go elsewhere if I could. Maybe keep the carnet away, you should get another temp import for Thailand.

Thought i might share the crossing with you all....

To put it in context, i ended up leaving my hostel from Siem Reap around 1130am due to hangover in the morning lol and it was saturday so i expected the worst

Anyway was a relatively smooth drive there... arrived into poipet... cambodian customs house was on my right going through the town towards the border... stopped jumped out, went straight into see the carnet officer and he signed me out within about 30 seconds... didn´t see car at all... next was cambodian immigration... just before the security point there was a small immigration booth on the right which was well sign posted... no queue... so that only took 2 minutes to stamp me out.... Cambodia done in around 5 minutes

Into the no mans land between... casinos everywhere... I resisted and headed straight through... as you approach the vehicle crossing... you will see the immigration queue at your left, which was sizeable at this point... i pulled up and parked at the checkpost and almost straight away án English speaking officer approached me... I have a carnet but decided not to mention it if possible, i didnt want to get into the situation of getting stamped in, and having trouble getting stamped out... he basically gathered a few sheets and he asked me for a copy of my passport and vehicle ownership papers.... i had copies so handed them straight over... he then said i should go to immgration while he fills out the forms...

The immigration part was the longest time for everything... i waited nearly an hour queuing with other foreigners for passport control... after a while, the same officer as before came in and took me to the front of queue to fast track everything...

i went back to the checkpost and the officer handed me a completed “information of conveyance“ form with attached photo copies of my passport and ownership papers... he previously had mentioned an overtime fee that incurs on ´saturdays and sundays only... it was 25 baht or $1.... and the guy was helping me a lot so i didnt fight it, although to my surprise he gave me a receipt for the payment.... he gave me all the docs and said proceed through to the customs checkpoint for their checking...

I stopped there and a two youg girls assisted me, ... they were friendly but a little confused with my information and not much english... with a little coaching by me they understood... their slight confusion was because i am a Australian passport but my vehicle ownership papers are from the UK... ohh also searching in their computer they couldnt for UK but rather it was established that GB was the code needed...

anyway after some back and forth it was sorted and i was given a “customs declaration form“ .... i had seen one of these before and when i spotted a whole stack of them i did inquire as to whether i needed one, they asked if i had one and i said no, so they typed it up quick for me.... they should do it anyway...

after that i was free to go... i was told to retain everything and hand it all back at exportation..... everything took between 1hr30 to 2 hrs..... but all very friendly and easy going...

i then pushed on to Bangkok and arrived last night around 830pm... staying at the “backpackers airport lounge and hostel“ 99 baht per night for dorm room... its only street parking for my car but the streets around here are blocked off by security, so to go in our out you must pass these security check points.....and everyone street parks around here...

anyway hope this helps anyone doing this cross any time soon..