VIETNAM

Issued: 1993

Code Number:                    Issued:

I930519                                          Maximum 50 (many unsold)

289

This is one of the rarest of all the phonecards produced by Telstra. The card was one of the first uses of the International Generic Card. It was produced for sale at a two week international surfing carnival held at China Beach, Danang, Vietnam. The carnival was the "Saigon Floating Hotel Surf Pro". Telstra OTC Australia was one of the Corporate Sponsors. The Planet Earth card was encoded with US$50.

The purpose of setting up the Vietnam cards was purely for goodwill, Telstra were never going to actually issue cards for Vietnam.

There were 150 cards produced in total with a serial number range of 28912000 to 28912149. The first 100 (28912000-28912099) were used solely for testing purposes, as the payphones were fully tested with these cards prior to leaving for the event. There were only 50 cards made available for sale in Vietnam. These had serial numbers 28912100 to 28912149. The actual number sold at US$50 each is unknown, but any unsold cards were to be returned to Telstra for destroying. Of those sold, how many were then actually used is unknown.

At the bottom of this page is an actual copy of the letter confirming the details of the cards for Vietnam.

All the first 100 testing cards and the unsold cards were supposedly destroyed, but this is not the case, as I have one of the testing cards. I have serial number 28912036.

Further research has shown that the prefix 289 cards were produced in boxes of 1,000. The first 10 boxes, 289 00000 to 289 09999 were used for Cambodia. The next box, 289 10000 to 289 10999 was used for testing Vietnam cards. To date, 3 cards have been found within this range. The box with 289 11000 to 289 11999 may also have been used for Vietnam testing, but no cards from this range have ever been seen. The following box with cards 289 12000 to 289 12999 is where the actual Vietnam cards came from. As mentioned, the first 100 were further testing and the next 50 the actual cards offered at the carnival. What the remaining cards in the box after 289 12149 had on them is not known. None have ever surfaced. After that, the rest of the 289 range was used for further Cambodia cards as well as Christmas Island.

To date, 4 cards have been sighted in the range 289 12000 to 289 12099, test cards, and 7 from the range 289 12100 to 289 12149, the Carnival cards. Some examples are displayed below.

 Anyone else who has a copy of this card, I would be grateful for a possible scan or at least a note of the serial number.