Parks to trial priority booking

Translated from Thai:

"The Department of National Parks has developed a reservation system to pay for national park services to facilitate tourists in the beginning of 2564.

Visitors can book and pay by paying and receive a convenient online service card. Booking and pre-payment will set 80 % of the amount of tourist quotas available (Carrying Capacity) under the COVID 19 situation. 

For visitors who don't book or plan ahead, there will be a chance to buy 20 % of National Park Pass fees at the checkpoint of national parks.

They will try to buy a ticket to the national park with automatic card vending machine. (KIOSK) in  a number national parks, those being 1) Phliw Namtok 2) Erawan 3) Khao Sok 4) Phu Kraduang 5) Phu Hin Rongkla 6) Jae Seong 7) Doi Inthanon 8) Khao Yai and 10) Chet Sao waterfalls

The National Parks Department launched the selling of KIOSK Passes on December 30, 2563.. If the system gets a good response from travelers, it will continue to expand to other national parks accordingly.

This implementation aims for transparency in balancing natural resources and environmental conservation and exploiting resources as a resource base that will forever create sustainable, wealthy and sustainable stability for the country."

The system for booking acconodation at the DNP website is also now operational again for some parks although we could not find any webpage for access tickets being available online (as of yet)
  
  




 

I hope it works out but I really dont know why they dont just outsource this whole thing and let someone with the infrastructure and know how to do it on a contractual basis. Say Booking.com or Agoda. 

I just registered for the accomodation booking - my old registration had disappeared from their system (which I dont mind) and I had to reregister. It reminded me of the my return to Thailand after the COVID lockout in that the process and computerized system and adminstrative requirements seems designed to be completely confusing and circa windows xp era. You have to go through a registration process which requires you to state your race (!?!) as well as submit a copy of your passport (as a foreigner) and emergency contacts. I do hope its in the pipelineto be replace this system with something else.

I dont have any confidence in the "Kiosks" either - what happened to the idea of let 7/11 manage advanced ticket issuance? And the QueQ app seems to be easy to use and exists for national parks already, why not just add a payment gateway to QueQ for entering the national parks?

Lets hope this is just the start of something better to come.