Phuket lucky license plate auction raises more than Bt23mn

PHUKET: The sixth annual “Lucky License Plate Auction” held in Phuket Town over the weekend raised 23,504,500 baht, Kanok Siripanichkorn, chief of the Phuket Land Transport Office (PLTO), has told the Phuket Gazette.

“I am very happy with the revenue raised – it’s five million baht more than last year,” he said.

All 301 plates up for auction were sold, averaging 78,088 baht apiece – the highest average ever at the annual Phuket event, Mr Kanok added.

The event last year raised 18,745,500 baht, averaging 62,277 baht per plate.

Securing the top bid of 1.4 million baht at the auction this year was license plate Kor Nor 9999.

Most of the money raised from the auction will go to the Department of Land Transport’s national Road Safety Foundation to help pay for road-safety campaigns, Chief Kanok explained.

“Some of the revenue will be handed over to Phuket educational institutions and to local police to help fund local road-safety campaigns, and some will go toward helping disabled people in Phuket,” he added.

“Every single baht will be returned to society,” chief Kanok assured.

One of the key attractions of the annual event is that it gives people the chance to make merit, he added.

As next year’s event will feature license plates with the Thai characters Gor Bor, “I believe anyone with the nickname ‘Gob’ [pronounced ‘Gop’, meaning ‘frog’] will be interested in taking part,” Chief Kanok said.

— Janpen Upatising