Whose roof it is

A flooded household in Thailand can be paid from three different pots. Each has its own rules, its own dates and its own answer to one question: whose house is this?

The answer decides whether the tenant, the landlord or nobody gets the money.

The line that comes first: a declared zone

None of the three pays unless the home is inside an area the state has formally declared.

There are two kinds of declaration, and Bangkok has both. With effect from 25 September, the city’s disaster-prevention directorate declared all 50 districts a disaster area. On 26 September the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department declared 38 districts and 118 sub-districts an emergency assistance zone, the declaration the Finance Ministry’s relief rules work from. The flat payment accepts either declaration, on the department’s own description of the Cabinet criteria. The Bangkok administration says further areas can be added to the assistance zone if a survey and evidence show damage.

A home outside the declared map can be just as wet. It is outside every scheme that uses that map until the map is redrawn.

Pot one: the flat household payment

This is the Cabinet’s money, paid per household at a flat rate.

On 25 August 2026 the Cabinet set the criteria for floods in this rainy season. On 29 September it extended the payments to a further 24 provinces. On the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department’s description and the government’s registration guidance:

• ฿9,000 per household where a regular residence was flooded for up to seven days and property was damaged, or flooded continuously for more than seven days;
• one payment per roof;
• a rented home qualifies, and the tenant is paid;
• a regular residence with no house registration can qualify after checks;
• for a death caused directly by the flood or a landslide, ฿2 million, described as funeral assistance.

It covers floods between 15 May and 30 September 2026. The Cabinet’s statement of 22 September said the window ends there because the new insurance begins the next day, to avoid overlapping with it. Claims go through the government’s Thang Rat app, which checks them against the civil registration database, or through the local council. Payment goes only to a PromptPay account linked to the claimant’s national ID number, through the Government Savings Bank.

Two further cases appear in the registration guidance: a home surrounded by water so that normal life was impossible for more than seven days, and a high-rise flat whose occupants were similarly cut off. The amount for a surrounded home is reported inconsistently. The registration guidance, as Thansettakij and Thairath reported it on 2 October, lists it among the cases for the ฿9,000 payment. The department’s public-relations director said on 3 October that the Cabinet’s 29 September decision pays ฿5,000 for a surrounded home. Bangkok Lad has not seen the Cabinet resolution and cannot settle which applies.

Pot two: itemised repair money

This is older money, held by provincial governors and the Bangkok administration under Finance Ministry rules, and paid item by item against evidence.

New Finance Ministry criteria apply to disasters from 6 March 2026, on the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department’s summary of them, and the Bangkok administration published its figures on 1 October. Bangkok’s ceilings include:

• house-repair materials, up to ฿88,600 for a house damaged throughout (previously ฿49,500);
• temporary accommodation, up to ฿3,000 a month for up to two months;
• tools and working capital, up to ฿13,500 a household;
• medical costs of up to ฿2,000 as an outpatient and ฿4,000 as an inpatient, and a ฿2,300 payment for injury;
• funeral costs, up to ฿35,700;
• basic living costs of roughly ฿1,900 to ฿3,800, depending on the damage.

The house-repair item is for an owner who lives in the house. The Ministry’s criteria, as the department summarised them, cover a regular residence the victim owns and exclude a rented house. The Bangkok administration says repair money “relates to the house owner”, and said on 3 October that a landlord who lets the house out does not get it either. A tenant can claim the other items, including temporary accommodation, with evidence of the tenancy and of living there.

In Bangkok a police report is no longer required. Claims can be made at the district office or online, within 90 days of the declaration, the administration says. The Thang Rat app and the city’s own online system are not linked, and it advises using both.

Pot three: the new insurance

On 1 October 2026 a state-bought disaster insurance policy came into force, covering homes across the country for a year. Its terms, as described by the Thai General Insurance Association, the insurance regulator and the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department:

• about 30 million homes, defined by the civil-registration meaning of “house”. That means a house number and regular occupants, plus about 400,000 occupied homes without a number that the Interior Ministry has listed. A registered address with nobody living there is not covered, nor is a factory, business premises or a temple. The regulator says a shophouse is covered where people live in it;
• a condominium unit with its own house number, which the regulator says is covered above the ground floor when water surrounds the building for more than seven days;
• flood, storm and earthquake, in a declared zone, causing direct damage;
• the structure and its fixtures only: walls, built-in furniture, wallpaper. Not free-standing furniture, appliances or personal belongings, and not trees or fences;
• for flood damage, an initial ฿10,000 paid without waiting for a full assessment (฿5,000 for a storm or an earthquake), then the assessed damage up to ฿100,000 per house for each disaster;
• for a death caused directly by the disaster, ฿2 million, and ฿200,000 for total permanent disability, for Thai nationals;
• claims within two years, made online, through a LINE account, by telephone or at local claim points. Identity is verified through the state’s ThaiD system, and payment is due within 15 days once the claim is agreed and the papers are complete.

The insurance pays the owner. The association says payment goes “mainly to the owner of the property, to prevent disputes where owner and occupier are different people”. A tenant can claim only with the owner’s authorisation.

The Cabinet budgeted ฿15.5 billion for the premiums: ฿15 billion for the homes and ฿500 million for the death and disability cover. Claims on the home cover across the year are capped at ฿75 billion, the association says. Beyond that the insurance stops and help returns to the state’s ordinary relief.

The initial payment for a home surrounded by water, rather than flooded, is reported both ways. The association said on 2 October that it is ฿10,000. The Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department said on 3 October that it is ฿5,000, with up to ฿95,000 more on assessment. Bangkok Lad has not seen the policy wording.

The seam on 1 October

The flat household payment covers floods up to 30 September. The insurance covers floods from 1 October.

Damage from before 1 October is outside the insurance, the association and the regulator say, and is handled by the state’s existing relief. No flat household payment for floods after 1 October has been announced. The Cabinet’s 22 September statement gave the reason the window closes: the insurance begins the next day.

What changes at the seam is who is paid. Up to 30 September, the household payment for a flooded rented home went to the tenant. From 1 October, the new insurance pays the owner of the building, and it covers none of the contents, whoever owns them. The itemised repair money in pot two continues on both sides of the date. It pays an owner who lives in the house, and nothing for the house when it is let.

The Cabinet’s own statement asked agencies to check how people missing from the databases would be reached, naming people in remote areas, people without civil registration and tenants.

What this adds up to

This is three systems with three definitions of a home.

The flat payment counts households, including tenants and unregistered homes. It is the only one of the three that is built around the people inside the house.

The repair money and the insurance count buildings and the people who own them. Both have ceilings well above the flat ฿9,000. Neither pays a tenant for the house. The repair money pays nothing for a rented house at all, and the insurance pays nobody for what was inside it.

All three begin from a line on a map. A flooded home outside every declared zone is outside every one of them.

And all three pay through the state’s registers: a declared zone, a house registration, a national ID linked to PromptPay, a verified identity on a government app. The flood is physical. The money follows the paperwork.

Nothing in this article is advice on any claim, and nothing in it says any household will or will not be paid.

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Common misconceptions

“The ฿9,000 goes to the house owner.” Under the government’s registration guidance, a rented home qualifies and the tenant is paid.

“Renters get nothing.” Tenants can receive the flat household payment and claim several items of the itemised relief. They cannot claim house-repair money, and the new insurance pays the owner.

“The landlord gets the repair money for a rented house.” Not under the Finance Ministry’s criteria as the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department summarised them: repair money is for a home the victim owns and lives in, and rented houses are excluded.

“The new insurance covers my furniture and appliances.” It covers the structure and fixed fittings only.

“The insurance covers last month’s flood.” It covers disasters from 1 October 2026. Earlier damage falls to the state’s existing relief.

“Any flooded home qualifies.” All three schemes require the home to be in a formally declared disaster zone.

“You need a police report.” Not in Bangkok, under the administration’s revised process.