Thailand Tourism

THAILAND TRAVEL NEWS: Visitors, expatriates or Thais wanting information on tourism related events – or wanting to make a complaint – can now speak directly with the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) over the internet.

For the past two months the TAT has been trialling an internet based “tourist hotline” call centre on its website (www.tourismthailand.org) providing 24-hour-a-day, seven-days-a-week service – including public holidays – in English and Thai.

In the first two months more than 3,000 people from 18 different countries used the service, which is accessed by clicking the “1672 tourist hotline” banner link near the bottom of the TATs website.

People who log in to the call centre first select the language they wish to communicate in and then enter their name and an email address, along with the topic they require assistance or information on.

The link then connects to the TAT call centre where an option exists for callers to open a two-way audio and video link with the call centre operator using Adobe Flash, or to communicate by typing their request.

Suraphon Svetasreni, deputy governor for marketing communications, TAT, said the initiative is one of several the TAT was implementing to improve the manner in which people could communicate and interact with the authority.

He said the initiative is expected to be of great benefit to travel agents, visitors to Thailand, residents looking for more information on events, and hotel concierge desks.

While the service currently only offers English and Thai language support, Mr. Suraphon said support for other languages will be added in the future.lish and Thai language support, Mr. Suraphon said support for other languages will be added in the future.