BANGKOK, 20 March 2019: Efforts to make tour buses safer in Thailand got underway this month according to a Tourism Council of Thailand Facebook post.
Quoting heavily from a Thai language news report filed by Prachachart online the TCT says 5 to 6,000 buses could be certified safe for tourists by the end of next year.
The TCT post came just days after a tour bus hired to take students on a field trip from northeast Thailand to the coastal province of Chanthaburi crashed killing one student and seriously injuring 10 others.
There were 20 students and 19 teachers on board the bus when it was involved in a collision on highway 304 a road that has been earmarked for special measures to lower accidents during next month’s Songkran festival holiday.
Approximately 60 people die every day on Thailand’s roads. Now Thailand’s tourism officials say they will raise the safety bar for both land and sea transport. In response to the risks visitors face, travel advisories recommend tourists buy adequate accident insurance when visiting Thailand, although many insurance companies exclude motorcycle accidents from the cover.
The project to certify tour buses that can offer a higher standard of safety for visitors is now officially underway with the first buses due to be certified ahead of the Songkran festival mid-April.
Similar projects to raise the standard of boat safety and require a higher certification for captains will get underway at tourist resorts along the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand coasts, later this year. Improving boat certification and registration will also include river and canal vessels.
The Land Transport Transportation Council and the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) have been appointed to chair a safety committee to establish and manage the introduction of rules for land and water tour operators.
By the time the Songkran festival gets underway during the week of 13 to 15 April around 50 to 100 tour buses should be certified and by the end of a year as many 1,000, or about 10% of the available fleet of tour buses in the country. By the end of 2020, the certification could extend to around 5,000 to 6,000 vehicles
The committee is currently fine-tuning the criteria for certification, but the challenge will be managing certification, ensuring transparency and conducting checks and balances to recertify vehicles after the initial process expires.
Service and mechanical checks will be required of all buses and also checks of driver competency and the legal status of the companies owning the buses.
Security monitoring including GPS is required and drivers must comply with strict qualifications involving medical checks and tests for potential drug or drink abuse. They will also have to undergo specialised training applicable for driving tour buses and enrol in a programme to hone their civil defence skills to protect passengers during emergencies.
Once a tour bus has been certified a logo of the Thai Industrial Standards Institute will be displayed prominently on the bus to build traveller confidence.
Rental fees for certified buses will be higher than for regular buses to differentiate the service and quality levels. According to the Tourism Council of Thailand’s Facebook post having different rental prices will motivate investors to join the programme.
At present, the priority is to gain the confidence of bus operators to join the scheme and reach out to travel companies to understand that they should make the choice and use only certified buses in the future.
By the middle of this year the water safety (sea) standard project, in collaboration with various agencies and marine operators, starting with the compilation of safety standard rules for various tourist boats such as speed boats, local sightseeing boats and cruise vessels.
Initially, the project will focus on the Andaman Sea resorts such as Phuket and Krabi and then continue to other resorts such as Pattaya, Chonburi, Rayong, including Petchaburi and Hua Hin on the Gulf of Thailand and later on standards for boats on Bangkok’s Chao Phraya River by the end of this year.
(Source: Tourism Council of Thailand Facebook quoting the Thai language report https://www.prachachat.net/tourism/news-302881.)
It’s pleasing to hear that they try to create safety but not sure whether they will do it firmly and continuously and if they don’t it will lead to a bad image for them and Thai tourism that suggests they couldn’t stop or reduce the number of accidents.