Aussies are left baffled by a sign spotted next to a telephone box – as others are simply shocked pay phones are still in regular use
- Australian shoppers have been left puzzled over a note in a public phone booth
- The note asks for phone users to be courteous and keep calls to 15 minutes long
- Many people were shocked there was a need for the note on a public phone box
A sign asking payphone users to spend no more than 15 minutes at a time in the public phone box has left hundreds of Australians puzzled.
The note, which was fixed next to the phone, and above the phonebook holder in the public phone box asked customers to ‘keep all calls brief and no longer than 15 minutes’.
A Brisbane shopper noticed the sign in a phone booth in Aspley in the city’s north and posted a photo online, baffled over the apparent popularity of the phone.
‘This pay phone must be in high demand,’ he said, sharing the photo.
An awkward note asking payphone users to spend no more than 15 minutes at a time in the public phone box has Australians puzzled
But some people saw nothing amiss in the photograph.
‘It’s just common courtesy. There use to be signs like that in most payphone way way back in the day,’ one man said.
Others were shocked there were still working phone boxes in Australia – and that they were in high demand.
‘I had no idea payphone still existed,’ one man admitted.
While many said it had been a decade or more since they needed to use a phone box.
Telstra payphones were common fixtures in Australia in the 90s before the widespread use of mobile phones.
There are still more than 15,000 on the telephone boxes across Australia which are maintained and managed by the telco who have an obligation to provide ‘reasonably accessible’ phone booths across the country.
The upgraded phonebooths perform all of the decades-old features, including free emergency calls, 20c SMS and local and international voice calls but also act as Telstra WIFI hotspots.
Some of the people commenting on the post revealed they are avid users of public phones.
‘You can send SMS from payphones. Costs 20cents. I’ve sent texts to mates from phone boxes when I’ve had no credit. It shows up on their mobile phone screen as ‘Telstra Payphone’,’ one man said.
Others agreed the 15-minute rule was fair but shouldn’t need to be expressed as it should be a common courtesy.
Payphones can be located using the Payphone finder on the Telstra website.
Telstra charges 50cents for untimed calls to fixed landlines across Australia.
Calls to mobiles were changed in 2019 from 50c per 35seconds to 50c for ten minutes to Australian mobiles.
The affordable price-structure could have lead to people using the public telephone for extended periods.