Landline phones in Thailand to be charged by minute

[Bangmod]

Anyone got the profit figures from any of these operators?

Ask the boss in Dubai….

he needs to make up for his losses, so he tell the Thai public, you fault AIS, I make you pay…...

[bangon04]

Now let us consider other "Services" in Thailand which could start to charge by the minute, in the interests of greater turnover and profits and efficiency.

[Thaiready]

Mines been per minute for 3 years.....

[GeorgeO]

Designed to reduce people hogging up land lines unnecessarily, reduce the rumour mongering and to raise more revenue perhaps for the cash strapped insolvent government.

The impact on running costs to business and government departments will be immensely expensive.

I disagree; most business calls are quite brief, unless we are talking about conference calls, so the unit cost will actually be reduced for any call of less than six minutes.

[Aceicol]

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.

Phone calls are a lot cheaper (in comparison) now in the UK rather than when BT was state owned and with a monopoly. State ownership doesn't automatically equal good value for money. Much better to let private business compete against each other to drive prices down. As for the money going to the government or private business, does it really matter, it's out of your pocket and into someone elses either way.

[Rorri]

bangon04, on 21 Mar 2014 - 16:14, said:

Now let us consider other "Services" in Thailand which could start to charge by the minute, in the interests of greater turnover and profits and efficiency.

It would be one way to make the tuk tuk and taxi drivers slow down.

[Rorri]

GeorgeO, on 21 Mar 2014 - 16:41, said:

MK1, on 21 Mar 2014 - 09:25, said:

Designed to reduce people hogging up land lines unnecessarily, reduce the rumour mongering and to raise more revenue perhaps for the cash strapped insolvent government.

The impact on running costs to business and government departments will be immensely expensive.

I disagree; most business calls are quite brief, unless we are talking about conference calls, so the unit cost will actually be reduced for any call of less than six minutes.

Here's something sexist, but true. When I worked for Telstra, Australia's largest Telco, they designed the amount of equipment, in a telephone exchange, with a formula that took into consideration the demographics of the area, not for the number/size of businesses, but for the number of women....yes, they really do spend more time on the phone.

[Thai at Heart]

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!!!

Thaksin was granted a massive monopoly yes.

Moaning about what happened to BT, and what it has become in terms of being a communications and media mammoth, is crazy. Telecos and media in the UK is incredibly competitive today, with massive choice, and they have undertaken a slow but sure enormous upgrade of infrastructure which would probably never have happened if the government had had to undertake it. Streaming on demand TV is available in a way that would never have occured if BT had stayed in public hands. I don't disagree with what you say about a balance of private and public intgration, but reality is, telecoms is maybe not the right one to discuss. Rail, and water/electricity is a better debate.

Expecting the government to implement all modern day infrastructure for telecoms is a step too far,

[nithisa78]

Makes perfect sense really.

I have always wondered at the flat rate fee - as someone already said, Thais will spend literally hours on the 'phone just gossiping - I've even seen instances where someone will lay the handset down, go and make a meal or whatever and come back to continue the conversation half an hour or more later.

Patrick

That is worldwide.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I almost never see any Thai people actually using or talking on landlines. It's all mobile phone use and calls, at least among individuals.

And even often for business calls, when some staff person gives me their phone number to call them back, it's more often their mobile number (which may well be provided by their company) than a fixed line number.

I keep a fixed line number at home, mainly just to have it, and in case I ever want to have DSL Internet again. But most of the time, I'm just paying 107 baht per month to TOT-True for keeping an unused line.

[rametindallas]

There is some sound logic in this.

Under the current billing system, Thai people will talk to their friends for 15 to 20 minutes, or even longer, with no real aim to the conversation. Once they find that the price goes beyond the old 3 baht charge as soon as they have been on the line 6 minutes and 40 seconds, they may just find something better to do with all that remaining time...!!

Yeah, there's always something better to do than maintain close connections among family and friends. /sarc

[3NUMBAS]

except BT with their stranglehold on BB and service charges keeping prices high

[Ghostnigel]

Dang. No more using the phone as a baby monitor.

How does baby know how to dial your phone?....55555 ( ok, i'll get my coat)

[connda]

And this hurts who the worst? The rural poor.

Poor telephone companies can barely make ends meet. Telephone executives forced to drive Toyota's because of bonus cuts -- But Wait!!! Here's an idea. Let's milk the poor for everything they're worth.

[connda]

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.

I told my wife. Wife voted to cut the land line permanently and save 100 baht / month. I abstained from voting. Bye bye land line.

[Beetlejuice]

I guess it`s all to do with that these days many customers are now using mobile phones, Skype, emails, texting and so on and less and less are using landlines, including public telephones, which means the phone companies are getting in less revenue from landlines and have to increase prices to the existing landline customers in order to maintain the present standard of service.

I can fully understand the reasons for the introduction of the charges by minute scheme and don`t consider this as unreasonable.