Neglected phone booths to get major makeover, some will have Wi-fi, some will have…defibrillators?

TOT has announced a big revamp of the majority of its public phone booths in Bangkok in order to get people to start using them again.

Before you start laughing as you read this story on your smartphone, thinking “What use does anyone have for a pay phone anymore?” TOT actually has some good ideas about how to modernize these rarely-used kiosks, reported Bangkok Post.

Instead of coin-operated phones, the remodeled boxes will feature Wi-Fi service and machines that let you top up your mobile phone credit.

They expect the revamp to be done by 2019.

Weirdly, they are also planning for 300 Bangkok booths to have automatic defibrillators that will allow users to conveniently save themselves from cardiac arrest on the roadside.

TOT has inked a deal with the National Institute for Emergency Medicine to install the defibrillators. It’s called, “Telephone booth helps life.”

These days, the public phone booths that are still in service don’t get much use. Ten years ago, each booth would make about THB10,000 per month. Today, each booth makes about THB200 each month.

TOT owns 120,000 phone booths across the country and 20,000 of them are in Bangkok.

 


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