By Graham K. Rogers

A while back when Apple changed the online purchasing systems worldwide, those of us in Thailand who cannot read Thai faced a difficulty as the English language pages that had been available for the online store here were gone. Representations were made. Local users also wrote to Apple. With the usual reticence, the best I could get from the company was that they were thinking about it.

With changes to the Apple lineup this week, I had been looking at several of the pages, comparing prices when a local user directed me to a link that appears at the bottom of some screens: an English language version for the Thai store. It is best to follow the products listed down the page as the links at the top go back to the Thai pages and not all of the product pages have the "Shop In English" link (which takes you back to the start page anyway).

I had the perfect opportunity to try this out today as the new Apple Watch Sports Bands have not yet arrived in the stores here, and I would really like one of the new Royal Blue ones. I shall think later about the new Woven Nylon bands: I just cannot make my mind up about which colour(s) to buy.

As well as the band, I decided to have one of the new Lightning to USB cables. The 2m version is priced at 1200 baht, while the 0.5m one is 790 baht; but so is the 1m cable, which is the one I wanted. I put this and the band in the basket and headed for the checkout.

All my details (as usual) were remembered and this time I did not need to go through the drawn-out process of entering location in Thai. However, at the Payment section there was a problem. On the page was "We're sorry, your order does not meet the minimum required total of ฿5,000.00" which I had never seen before. Indeed I had made some purchases of under 1,000 baht so this was a new wrinkle: was it an Apple rule, one imposed by the credit card companies, or the Thai tax man?

None of the above, as it happens.

I tried the Chat system - there is a button on the page - but that cut and when I tried again it was dead. I then phoned using the Assistance number (001 800 656957) which connected me with a helpful young lady who is apparently somewhere in Malaysia.

We confirmed the order, my details and my AppleID, but the total price she gave me when we examined the order, was not the same. A look at the prices - my end and hers - showed that the cable was actually 950 baht. This put the order up slightly. The transaction was completed by phone and the items should arrive Wednesday.

As confirmation, she had used the same page I had for making the order and also saw the 5,000 baht limit warning but had ignored it. As the page is for credit cards and installments, for which there is a 5,000 baht minimum, it would appear that this was the reason.

I expect that the warning could be removed or adjusted for customers using credit cards, and I also expect that Apple will revise the pricing for the cable for its own good.

Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs. He is now continuing that in the Bangkok Post supplement, Life.