Abstract:
This research aims to study legal measures to prevent offence from illegal lending in
comparison with foreign laws and to find a guideline of solving problems of legal enforcement
related to prevention of illegal lending so that the solution for illegal lending can be achieved
according to true intention. This study is a qualitative research emphasizing documentary research
by examining and researching data and documents in both Thai and foreign language including
legal provisions, explanations, academic textbook, article of lawyers, thesis, independent studies
and supreme court judgment.
The study result reveals that although Thailand has a number of laws that are enforced
with offence owing to illegal lending, they are not laws particularly employed for supervising
illegal lending business. In addition, currently enacted laws do not cover manners, circumstance
and severity of offence from illegal lending and the penalty is weak and disproportionate to the
crime. Furthermore, there are no authorities that have duties and responsibilities to audit, prevent
and monitor illegal lending business operation and to assist debtors who are injured from illegal
lending. The second issue is that legal measures to prevent illegal lending in foreign countries are
regulated of both civil and criminal responsibility differently but they do not stipulate offence and
penalty specifically related to illegal lending as they regulate only offence in case by case in each
legal provision. This is similar to Thai law; however, foreign countries have authorities that have
duties to audit, prevent and monitor illegal lending, in particular, such as the United States. The
final issue is to make legal provisions for preventing illegal lending effective, comprehensive and
proportionate to offence severity. It is necessary to determine criminal offence in relation with
illegal lending with regulation covering manners, circumstance and severities of offence and to
appoint illegal lending prevention and suppression commission. According to the study, it can be concluded that legal provisions for preventing illegal
lending in foreign countries compared with laws in Thailand were not stipulated of offence and
punishment pertaining to illegal lending, in particular. They are just regulated in case by case in
each law, which are not inclusive and proportionate to offence severity. Therefore, the researcher
proposes that criminal penalty be imposed on illegal lending by regulating it to include manners,
circumstance and severities of offence. Moreover, illegal lending prevention and suppression
commission should be particularly appointed.