Did you know that Sydney is home to the oldest working public telephone in Australia? You can find it on Argyle Street in the Rocks. Sydney was also the site of the country’s first ever public telephone – it was opened in March 1893 at the heritage listed Sydney General Post Office in Martin Place. The payphone, as it is now known, was introduced in the era of spandex and perms in 1986. But not all payphones are mere relics. Even in a world where most of us are walking around with a smartphone in our pocket, the humble payphone still has a valuable role to play – and no, it's not just for dreamy Instagram photos with vintage phone booths and grainy filters.
In the past year, about 11 million calls were made across Australia from Telstra payphones. This included more than 230 thousand calls to critical services like ‘000’ and Lifeline (13 11 14). In a landmark move, Telstra has announced that all Australians can now make local and national calls for free on its network of more than 15 thousand payphones. You can also use Telstra payphones to send texts, with national SMS services now also free. So we guess we can’t call them ‘payphones’ anymore?
“For many Australians, the availability of a payphone is a vital lifeline, especially for those who are vulnerable including the homeless, people who are isolated or someone escaping an unsafe situation,” said Telstra CEO Andrew Penn.
For the past five years, Telstra has offered free national calls on its payphones during the Christmas and New Year period, an initiative it works closely on with the Salvation Army. Last year there were over 464 thousand free calls and over 20 thousand free texts sent from payphones over Christmas. Telstra also offered free payphone services over the bushfire crisis – between January and March 2020 there were more than three million outgoing calls made, 115 thousand incoming calls (yes, you can call a payphone) and 164 thousand text messages sent.
The Salvation Army’s Major Brendan Nottle welcomed the news, saying: “This is an absolute game changer for many of the people we work with across the nation. The reality is this piece of infrastructure is absolutely critical because a lot of Australians either don’t have a mobile phone, lose it or the phone’s charger, or simply run out of credit.”
“Connection is absolutely vital for every human being, but particularly for those who are vulnerable. It’s really important for them to break down that sense of social poverty, social isolation, and to connect with a friend or with support services.”
You can find the closest payphones near you by using this handy tool, or click the ‘Search for a payphone’ button on telstra.com.au. Payphones will also become coinless from October 2021. International and calls to premium and satellite numbers will still incur a cost and customers can use a Telstra Phonecard for this.