Landline phones in Thailand to be charged by minute

[andygunther]

Not a big change for me as I have been calling mobile phone for 5 years using my TOT landline and I always pay by the minutes.

I guess that the 3 bahts per call fee is landline to landline only.

Yes, you right... If you call to mobile phones, you have to pay by minutes.

And the minute price depends on where the SIM card is purchased.

[rijb]

What are those spaghetti-like wires over the streets? phone? power? or both? It can't be cheap to tie all those knots.

[Sydebolle]

Well, the TOTs, TT&T, ATT and god-only-knows-what-kind-of-Ts are moving from the 19th to the 15th century.

Had six landlines which in 90% did not work due to copper cable theft. I finally had it and went to cancel the lines with the billing partner TOT. TOT told me to go to TT&T as they installed it; TOT would only bill. I went to TT&T and they told me I would need company papers, shareholder EAGM resolution, passport copies of all directors etc. etc. etc.

So I told them that I would just stop paying them and had my picture taken at the TT&T shop in Carrefour Pattaya showing the cancellation request. I went back two, three times a year to no avail. Two months ago - after four years of billing me THB 107/monthly per line - the outstanding clocked a hefty THB 31'458. I went back to TT&T and told the (always new) staff, that the subscriber unfortunately died. Guess what - no more bills!

Unless you make use of a competitive package offered by your mobile phone provider there is always SkypeOut as an option, Viber is another one.

The entire thing is just one more proof of what kind of lovely banana republic we are enjoying on a daily basis. Don't get excited, just switch to alternatives which are readily available.

[ikke]

How often does anyone use a landline for phone calls these days?

I guess people will just stop using landlines all together.

Ever heard of businesses?

In my company 17 people in the office, only use cell phone and voip, I don't even have a land line.

Fax don't use either, when someone ask me why I don't have a fax, I answer I didn't know that still exist, I thrown my last one on the garbage 15 years ago.

Get an internet line on the coax cable, and no pre-history tel provider needed .

[wolfhead]

Come to New Zealand where we aren't charged to minute.

[sprq]

How often does anyone use a landline for phone calls these days?

I guess people will just stop using landlines all together.

Whenever I can because it's much cheaper and much more pleasant to use a handset and there are no dropouts to another landline and .............. oh, go back to your expensive fancy gadget.

[JSPS]

The phone in my Bangkok apartment in 1971 charged by the unit. Exactly what that unit was was a mystery. But it was expensive. There were no cell phones back then so they had to make all their money off the hard-wired ones.

[Torrens54]

Ah, but what will happen if the "Caretaker," 555 Government gets booted out?

[Dogmatix]

At 0.45 baht per minute you have to talk for 6.7 minutes to get a charge of 3 baht. I rarely speak on the land line for more than that, so my cost is going to go down.

[impulse]

By my calculation, calls shorter than 6 minutes will be cheaper. That would cover 99% of my local calls. And I don't think that $0.84 per hour is too punitive for tying up a phone line.

Seems like maybe they're trying to capture some money from the folks that are still using dial-up to get to their Compuserve account to download music from Napster?.

Edited March 21, 2014 by impulse

[Seastallion]

How often does anyone use a landline for phone calls these days?

I guess people will just stop using landlines all together.

Exactly. It's about the mobile companies and internet companies.

[rubl]

Up to a point understandable, a flat rate of two Baht seems a bit old-fashioned.

Mind you, in the Bangkok area I live (khet Dusit) I see many payphones and used mostly by youngsters in would seem. A price increase will not go down well with them. Remember, not every one has either mobile or is Amply rich.

[horsewell]

It will be interesting how this pans out. Most people just use landlines for the internet... really we are just waiting for the internet service on mobiles to be as good as or better than the landline and no one will be using the old system at all, including fibre to your door, except for businesses. Is it that the landlines not viable at a fixed cost or is it that there is jealousy of the mobile providers? One way to sweeten the deal is to up the monthly line rental and offer X number of free calls and other services that are rarely fully for increased profit.

[MW72]

I can't see what the problem is. If you use the service more you pay more. Sounds fair to me. Most calls only last for 30 seconds to a minute (unless your calling a business and get put on hold) so the cost will go down.

There are plenty of alternatives as others have mentioned. In the UK you can get packages where calls are free to local numbers or after business hours so let's wait and see if they introduce those kind of tariffs.

[Rorri]

chainarong, on 21 Mar 2014 - 07:05, said:

Just like Australia, now Thailand , the rip- off really begins.

I think you have an axe to grind, local landline calls with Telstra are a fixed rate eg, 30c/call untimed, talk for as long as you want, National calls 25c/minute, mobile calls 36c/minute (https://www.telstra.com.au/home-phone/plans-rates/), hardly a "rip off." OK, before you say in the US local calls are free, you should understand that "local" is your suburb, if you call the adjoining suburb you pay a timed call. With Telstra you can call any metropolitan(across many suburbs) landline for 30c UNTIMED. Just how cheap do you want things?

[NHJ]

meanwhile, in the vast majority of the world, calling landline is free.

it's cheaper to call thailand from abroad than calling thailand from thailand LMAO!

[impulse]

meanwhile, in the vast majority of the world, calling landline is free. it's cheaper to call thailand from abroad than calling thailand from thailand LMAO!

It may be "included" in a monthly fee, but it ain't free anywhere that I'm aware of.

[Rorri]

Ianatlarge, on 21 Mar 2014 - 08:44, said:

Really. Imo nationalise the telephone companies. They are using public resources for personal profit. The tech behind phones is easy, simple, and cold be better implemented as a public monopoly. Try and avoid the mess that Australia is in.

The mess Australia is in is because the public were fooled into believing that private business would create competition and therefore a better service opposed to a Government Department, Telstra(previously Telecom Australia and before that PMG).

[Rorri]

Pompey50, on 21 Mar 2014 - 10:02, said:

This is a problem for phone company's around the world, now most people here in the UK and increasingly in places like Thailand are using the internet and VOIP services to communicate. So they are not making money on phonecalls: their traditional money maker: any more.

They provide the networks, but others like skype are making the profits. For a number of years now I have had a Skype world subscription. I can chat to friends in Thailand for as long as I want for no extra cost over that of the subscription.

I understand your point, but many of these phone companies are also the ISP's, so they might lose a little on landline phone calls, but that same line can be used to provide an ADSL service at a higher monthly cost than a landline, you also need a package giving an upload speed close to 1MB/s for quality Skype video calls, more profit to the ISP's.

[ukrules]

From long time I activated SkypeOut Unlimited World: 10,49USD

You can call unlimited any landline and mobile in Thailand and most landlines in the world.

Usually after the first call to my mom overseas is already a deal for me.

This will probably change now they use per minute billing.

[MW72]

meanwhile, in the vast majority of the world, calling landline is free. it's cheaper to call thailand from abroad than calling thailand from thailand LMAO!

It may be "included" in a monthly fee, but it ain't free anywhere that I'm aware of.

Nothing is free. The cost is recovered somewhere. NHJ must be a bit of a telecoms expert as he seems to know about tarrifs in the "vast majority of the world" so maybe I am mistaken.

[laobali]

They arleady charge a monthly fee of over 100 baht for basic line rental. It's no wonder the telecommunications industry creates fugitives with giant empires.

You think that's expensive? BT in the UK charge about 850 baht.

[MW72]

meanwhile, in the vast majority of the world, calling landline is free. it's cheaper to call thailand from abroad than calling thailand from thailand LMAO!

It may be "included" in a monthly fee, but it ain't free anywhere that I'm aware of.

Nothing is free. The cost is recovered somewhere. NHJ must be a bit of a telecoms expert as he seems to know about tarrifs in the "vast majority of the world" so maybe I am mistaken.

British Telecom UK charges as of April 2013: Local call: 9p/min (4.81 Baht/min). International day time call to Thailand: 92.81 p/min (49.66 Baht/min). International evening call to Thailand: 89.9 p/min (48.10 Baht/min).

I think the tarrif of 0.45 Baht/min is quite cheap. Cetainly not more expensive to call a Thai number from Thailand than it is to call Thailand from the UK.

[rayw]

Really. Imo nationalise the telephone companies. They are using public resources for personal profit. The tech behind phones is easy, simple, and cold be better implemented as a public monopoly. Try and avoid the mess that Australia is in.

Here here. Same happened in the UK in the dreadful 80's when that minority elected ring wing bitch Thatcher, with only 42% of the electorates votes, privatised the then excellent British Telecom (BT) who were one of the most envied and respected Comms companies in the world before she screwed them up. After privatisation of course the call costs rose (actually she put call charges up ready for that a year or so before privatising BT), as obviously now you have to provide fat cat profits on top of the normal cost of the operation. Stands to bloody reason and with the land lines then the new BT private company had a bloody monopoly too and fed more wealth to the Thatcher paymasters, bloody corruption of course.

Just look what a fat cat Thaksin became from the rip off private comms industry and yet he paid glib lip service to the Thai people as to his false Socialist ideals, and Thai folk obviously lapped it up as they saw an only chance to rid themselves of the ruling class elite who had screwed them for generations. Quite clearly to anyone with open eyes and open mind could see that Thaksin himself was just another one of the elite ruling class and dangerously he was a clever con artist and a fraud too (similar to Thatcher actually but she was cleverer and got away wit it). Clearly why he was convicted for fraud of course as the evidence was so massive and damning. He of course proved his guilt by jumping bail even though his brother in law and his beloved TRT, or was it then PTP, were in power at teh time of his trial, so hardly a political run away action as he pathetically claims. The PTP policies for the Thai people are good on paper, they just need to rid themselves of the corrupt Shinawat clan and bring in real true Thai people that will work for the people and make their on paper policies REAL policies that work. I am sure those potential candidates they are out there if only the Thai folk would wash out all the corrupt and destructive crap from the PTP. Just my two cents worth of course as not my country but I would like to see a much better deal for the true ordinary Thai folk as I do actually love this country and want to see it happier and more successful in the future.

Anyway I digress. For the record I am not actually Socialist and neither am I Capitalist either, in fact I am both. Sure public service industries should NEVER be privatised but properly state run as a service to the people (yes a public service). TV makers and retail outlets and the like in true competitive industries of course are fine as private Capitalist based organisations. We need both Socialism and Capitalism in all sensible countries as both have good sides that are right for most societies so we just need to wash out the destructive extremes we see so prevalent these days. That is why in the UK I am a devout Lib Dem as they are for 100% sure the only true centre based party there and do not give in to paymaster lobbyists either. Time they had a chance at full Government control next year in the UK general elections and why there is truly no other sensible non-extreme alternative, other than the two failed main parties that have proved they are both incapable. Do we really as Brits want more of that same crap any more?? IMHO opinion that is!!!

Edited March 21, 2014 by rayw

[Dap]

How often does anyone use a landline for phone calls these days?

I guess people will just stop using landlines all together.

Ever heard of businesses?

Or bureaucracies/governments?

[somchaismith]

They arleady charge a monthly fee of over 100 baht for basic line rental. It's no wonder the telecommunications industry creates fugitives with giant empires.

You think that's expensive? BT in the UK charge about 850 baht.

I don' think it's expensive - I know it's legal robbery.

What does the UK have to do with the price of fish?

Edited March 21, 2014 by somchaismith

[toolpush]

Really. Imo nationalise the telephone companies. They are using public resources for personal profit. The tech behind phones is easy, simple, and cold be better implemented as a public monopoly. Try and avoid the mess that Australia is in.

Great idea. Let the government run it, governments are so good at running businesses. The post office, the Soviet Union, Cuba, Venezuela come to mind...........

[masuk]

Just like Australia, now Thailand , the rip- off really begins.

I just arrived back in Oz for 2 weeks. Had to pay $15.00 for a 2Gb modem card! No wonder the Telcoms make such huge profits.

[belg]

mmhh, in the west, they have free calls after business hours, but here they need to start a new thing, back to the past...

once a landline is set, and they sell adsl on it, what other costs are there ???

[MikeWill]

Most people just use landlines for the internet, so how about ADSL Internet?

Will it be an end of it?