More than 34.000 views and 705 comments in less than a month. Site administrator “John” believes this amount of activity is unprecedented. The forum thailand-portalen.dk has been the scene of an infuriated debate since user Bjarne T. Jensen accused Piro Consulting Group and its owner Robert Kronberg of scamming him and his girlfriend for 17.200 THB.
The accusation of fraud itself should be enough to ignite a debate, and the fact that Robert Kronberg is a well-known figure among Danish expatriates in Thailand might just be fuel to the fire. Robert Kronberg is a former member of the board of the Danish-Thai Chamber of Commerce, former chairman of Scandinavian Siam Society and according to his Facebook-account he has lived in Thailand for 13 years.
Within few hours and before Robert Kronberg got to defend himself, several members of the site had already started bashing the accused by sarcastically referring to him as Guru Robert and Mr. Kronhjort (Danish word meaning Stag in English). The debate quickly escalated to cover everything from Robert Kronberg’s business models to Bjarne T. Jensens intensions of bringing his girlfriend to Denmark.
The conflict in short
The dispute started the 11th of June when Bjarne T. Jensen hired Piro Consulting Group (PCG) to translate and legalize his Thai girlfriends’ documents. First the documents were to be translated and verified at the Thai Foreign Ministry and later, when the couple had arrived in Denmark, the documents should be handed over to the Danish Embassy for legalization.
But things did not go that smoothly. According to Bjarne T. he told Robert that he could go ahead on the 23rd of June and then spend the next 23 days waiting for the documents to go through. Then he allegedly contacted PCG again several times until on the 9th of July he called to have the documents transferred to another company where the process was completed.
Robert does not think that Bjarne T. is presenting the course of actions in a correct manner. At the website he denies to go into details because he does not “want to publish intimate information about a client process”. What he did want to reveal was that he felt that he had been threatened by Bjarne and his girlfriend and that they had failed to provide him with a deadline for the task when he had asked for it.
Robert has denied to refund Bjarne T. the money, because he prior to the deal had sent a mail to Bjarne T. with the PCG terms and conditions where it says that the company has a no-refund policy.
The many replies and comments on the forum triggered journalist Bjarne Wildau to write an article where Robert Kronberg is given more opportunity to answer to Bjarne Wildau’s questions regarding Piro’s handling of the case. The article in Danish can be found here:
Og Bjarne W, hvorfor tror du, at jeg opgav at svare på DTW / Thailand Portalen?
Men du fortsætter en for mig ukendt agenda om advarsel mod visum-agenter. Tråden på DTW handler derimod ikke om visum.
Vi har aldrig lovet, at vi kan gøre specielle ting omkring visum, men der er mennesker, som ikke ønsker at gøre det selv. Desuden tror jeg efter mange, mange år, at jeg ved bare en lille bitte smule om visum til fx Danmark.
Jeg er også sikker på, at lederne på ambassaden har rengøringshjælp, og hvorfor har de det, for de kan jo gøre det selv.
Så hvis ambassaden har et seriøst problem med os, så har de også selv et seriøst problem med de private rengøringsfolk, nannies osv, der arbejder for dem, for de kan jo gøre det selv; og mon ikke en mor eller en far er bedre end en nanny?
Hilsen, Robert
Opfølgning med link til Den Danske Ambassades advarsel mod brug af visaagenter som Robert Kronberg / Piro Consultant.
Ambassaden advarer mod, at visumansøgere betaler agenter for bistand i forbindelse med indgivelse af visumansøgning. Vi er bekendt med, at sådanne agenter findes både i og udenfor Bangkok, herunder også i umiddelbar nærhed af VFS visum-outsourcing centret i Alma Link Building.
http://www.thaioaser.net/index.php/thailand-asien/662-advarsel-mod-brug-af-af-visaageenter-som-robert-kronberg-piro-consultant
Vedr. Robert Kronberg skal det med, at han svarede hurtigt og beredvilligt på alle Thaioasers.net’s spørgsmål. Havde han været lige så åben på Thailand Portalen, var det nok ikke gået så galt, som det gik.