Bangkok has got to be the only city where buying a monthly mass transit card costs more than just paying for all your individual trips. It was already the case for those using the BTS to travel only 1-3 stations each day (both ways). But it just got worse because of new rates the BTS has released. Adding insult to injury, the new rates, to be rolled out Jul 1st, are billed as “Promotional Fares."

New fares: 

Adults

Students

Previous fares: 

Adults

Students

The new rates are so expensive, you have to live five zones away from your workspace to start saving on the 15-trips card. How much will you save? One baht. The 30-day card comes out to 30 baht per trip versus 31 baht for a single five-zone ticket.

If you’re willing to splurge on the 40-trip card, things aren’t much better. You’ll need to travel through four zones to save 2 baht per trip. In this case, the 30-day card comes out to 26 baht per trip versus 28 baht for a single five-zone ticket.

Don’t forget that the rabbit card is B200 to start with. So if you’re saving 1 baht per journey, you’ll need 200 journeys to simply cover the card’s cost.

If you live three zones or fewer from your workplace, forget about the 30-day promotion altogether. It is dead to you.

If, on the other hand, you live 7-8 zones away, the 30-day trip card remains good value.  But you will have to be careful about carrying two cards, one “cash” card for shorter journeys, and one 30-day card for the longer ones. That’s right, not only our MRT, buses, BRT and BTS all use different cards, but now you need two different cards for the BTS.