The status of a penal fine is naturally prone to confusion, whether it is a civil debt or a criminal sanction, because of its being enforced on the defendantûs properties and because of its resemblance to a civil obligation. This confusion is aggravated by the Criminal Codeûs ambivalence on the issue and the mutatis mutandis application of the provisions regarding civil enforcement to fine enforcement scenarios. The consequence of this confusion is the tendency of Thai courts to treat a penal fine as a debt to be fully collected by whatever means. The frame of civil enforcement, which the courts seemingly adopt, contradicts the principles of punishment that require considerations for proportionality and an alignment with the penal purposes. Although the courts may use punishment-related frames in deciding about the fine in certain contexts, the resulted practice suffers from justificatory flaws like those in other contexts which are guided by the fine-as-debt frame. This article aims to bring attention to the problems of the unjust fining practice, which originated from the lawûs ambiguity and the confusion regarding the status of the fine. It also recommends that both the laws and the related practice be revised to be more compatible with the penal ethics and the principles of punishment.