Songkhla Families Secure 2M-Baht Death Payout; Others Limited to 9,000-Baht Aid

Southern households still surveying the wreckage left by last month’s storms woke up this week to a blunt message from Bangkok: the full 2 million-baht payout for a life lost is, for now, reserved for Songkhla and other districts that carry an emergency decree label. Everywhere else, relatives must wait for another cabinet review—and hope the rules change.

Key points at a glance

• 2 million baht death benefit currently locked to Songkhla only

• Government insists it is following the Disaster Prevention Act but signals possible tweaks

• A separate 9 000 baht flat payment is flowing to more than 600 000 households for property damage

• Chinese charities have already channelled over 30 million baht in private aid

• Digital snags with PromptPay have held up transfers for roughly 8 600 families

Why Songkhla gets the full cheque—and others do not

The cabinet’s emergency operations team, led by Prime Minister’s Office minister Paradorn Prissanananthakul, argues that the country’s state-of-emergency mechanism leaves little room for improvisation. Because the decree was invoked only in Songkhla, officials say they are legally bound to funnel the headline 2 million-baht compensation there first.

That stance has angered families in Pattani, Trang, Nakhon Si Thammarat and other hard-hit provinces who lost loved ones to flash floods, house collapses or evacuation accidents. Civil-society lawyers warn the government could face class-action suits over “unequal treatment,” pointing to international models where benefits follow the victim, not the postcode.

The anatomy of the 2 million-baht payment

Under the current design, each fatality triggers two pools of money: 1 million baht from the central budget and another 1 million baht from the Prime Minister’s disaster fund. A separate 20 000-baht royal grant is also released from the King’s personal purse.

To qualify, the death must have occurred between 22 – 27 November, be directly linked to flooding—such as drowning, death in a water-surrounded hospital, or a fatal accident while fleeing—and fall inside one of nine officially listed southern provinces. Yet only Songkhla checks all boxes because of the emergency tag. Officials insist an expansion could happen later, but no timeline exists.

If your house—not a family member—was hit

For everyone else, the tangible help right now is the one-off 9 000-baht household grant. The Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation (DDPM) teams up with Government Savings Bank to push money in daily waves. As of 5 December, 612 573 homes across eight provinces had split roughly 5.5 billion baht; a sixth batch covering 40 935 Songkhla and Trang households is landing today.

Qualification hinges on one of four flood scenarios—from short-term inundation to being marooned in a high-rise. Applications fly through the DDPM’s portal or local councils, and proof of residence is still required even though officials promise to slash red tape.

The PromptPay bottleneck—and how to clear it

Roughly 8 657 payouts bounced because the recipient’s ID number is not tied to PromptPay or the linked bank account is dormant. The DDPM now stations mobile vans in market squares so residents can reconnect their citizen-ID to a fresh account on-the-spot. Officials claim most cases will close within a week, yet warn that manual paperwork—death certificates, police reports and medical verdicts—remains non-negotiable for the larger 2 million-baht claims.

Foreign cash and local muscle join the effort

China’s ambassador Zhang Jianwei delivered a symbolic cheque to Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, topping up more than 30 million baht raised by Chinese business chambers. Thai corporates have sent water pumps, drones and thousands of N70 masks for mold clean-ups, while army engineers, volunteer divers and mosque youth groups carve the region into distinct work zones to avoid overlap.

Critical services are edging back: tap water is up everywhere except pockets near two washed-out bridges, power crews still test transformers serving 5 000 Hat Yai homes, and the telecom regulator says mobile coverage sits at 98 %.

Critics ask: are we repeating old mistakes?

Disaster-law scholars argue the patchwork approach shows Thailand’s response system still leans on ad-hoc decrees, fragmenting authority among ministry silos. They contrast it with Japan’s Disaster Relief Act, which sets a nationwide condolence grant, and the U.S. Stafford Act, where federal aid activates automatically once a governor requests it.

A prominent public-interest lawyer, Ronnarong Kaewpetch, is gathering affidavits from families outside emergency zones, preparing to test whether the Thai constitution’s equality clause can override the current compensation ceiling.

What to watch for next

• The National Security Council hints the emergency decree might be lifted early if water levels keep dropping—potentially freezing any geographic expansion of the 2 million-baht scheme.• A cabinet sub-panel meets next Tuesday to examine “supplementary relief scenarios,” its jargon for topping up provinces still excluded.• DDPM says a QR-based status checker will go live this weekend for people to track both death and household claims in real time.

For now, the simple truth is this: families in Songkhla can bank on the full payout. Everyone else must keep files ready, phones charged—and the pressure on.