Best Posts in Thread: Saving (money for that rainy or Hot days)

I've been having a problem that has caused me to "tighten my belt" a bit; my Xoom account was locked for suspicious activity (they think I'm laundering money ) and this was the only reliable way I had to get money into country. The timing was crap as my account was locked when I only had around P500 in my pocket . Pretty rough couple days last week but luckily, and somewhat surprisingly, some of the local friends I've made since becoming single have thrown out offers to feed me, come over with some alcohol and even offer to loan me some money until I get it sorted out....I've only taken a few of them up on the food and alcohol because I have expat friends that are due for repayment on cash loans and I've been going around and collecting on to hold me off until I get this nonsense sorted out. (I would rather starve for awhile than take money from locals that can't afford to be loaning out any money.)

I'm actually kinda happy for all this nonsense because it has shown me something that I didn't think could happen here, and that is; kindness can actually come back around. Also a bit surprising is that I didn't even ask for help from these locals, they just offered it as soon as they heard the reason why I had not been out for a couple days......most of the expats I had helped out in the past on the other hand...."that sucks, best of luck to ya". Some needed a reminder of that P10-30k that I had loaned them months back that had never been paid back. I do have a few friends here that are staying good on their word though.

Still don't have the Xoom thing figured out yet but I am going to go open a local bank account today (something I've been trying to avoid ever since I came to the Philippines) so that I have an alternative way to get myself cash. I was also able to Western Union myself a good chunk of change.....and at a horrible exchange rate and an excessive transaction fee.

 

I believe that I had asked my bank once if it could be possible to send a card to the PI....I think the response was a chuckle and then a "no". Might as well be sending cash through the postal service here. A debit card, even without the PIN could easily be used as credit with just a signature and my entire account cleaned out before bank or myself ever noticed. It's just way to risky to send something with access to that much money through the postal service here.

I walked out of BPI because when I went to open an account there was one person in front of me being served. The person who had the job of helping customers told me to go sit down for awhile and I would be next. I sat for 30 minutes waiting for that person to finish but then noticed after they finished they had let another person go ahead of me. I got up and asked what the deal was and they said that I needed to sign my name to a peace of paper (kinda like taking a number....but before the invention of flash cards that had numbers pre-printed on them). When handed the paper I had noticed that the 5 people that had walked in just before the person before me finishing had wrote their names down and they tried writing my name after everyone that had just walked in. I said "screw that" and walked out angrily. (While in there I had also noticed that everyone sitting down waiting in the main teller line.....of which only 1 of the 5 windows were open.....had been there before me and it was taking at least 15-20 minutes to serve each customer for something as simple as making a deposit.) If this is how they do business in their other branches I have no idea......but I wasn't about to go to the other branch and find out.

I went to RCBC because it was the closest bank to my location that I knew existed nationwide (mostly anyways). I went to the small branch across the street from Hotel Essentia. I walked in and they immediately started asking if I had all the requirements. I had everything except for x2 1"x1" photos. I ran down to 1 Hour Photo (or something like that) and got 4 of them for P40 in about 20-30 minutes and went back. Again they immediately took all my IDs/information and I started filling out the forms. About 30-40 minutes later they were asking me for the initial deposit (P500) and then handing me a ATM card. While I was in there I did not see a customer sitting and waiting for more than 10 minutes.

The only place RCBC screwed up was with forgetting taking my picture with their web-cam on the initial visit. I had actually left the branch to go meet someone else (who was paying back a loan) when the young lady called my mobile to tell me she forgot to get my picture. I went back, she took the picture and then I made another deposit with some of the money that had been given to me from the loan....I was in and out in 5 minutes. I haven't been a customer for a full day and I haven't even tried to use the ATM card yet but I am far more impressed with them than I was with BPI at this point. I feel the RCBC is far more professional and has a ton more common sense when dealing with customers than BPI......but again, I've only been a customer for less than 12 hours.

 

So I had my first go at using this account last night. Went to the ATM and changed the PIN and withdrew a bit of cash without issue (or transaction fees).

Checked the online banking and had no problem with the viewing account balance/deposit/withdrawal information. I was actually a bit surprised at everything else they were offering with their online banking and a few of the features would make life much easier......if I could get any of them to work. Tried paying my Globe internet bill with their online bill pay but got some error about a reference number being the wrong length (there was no field for me to enter a reference number anywhere on the page ). They offered OTA prepaid load as well but couldn't figure that one out either (on 2 different Globe numbers and one Smart). Checked the FAQs page and checked Google for a solution but came up completely empty. I emailed their customer support last night and just got a reply this morning, which is quite impressive, but they are asking for a WAY too much account information before they will assist with the problem (basically everything except for my social security number and account passwords )

My Xoom account also happened to get unlocked yester day as well so I tried a bank to bank transfer and it the money was showing in the RCBC account after about 20 minutes. Looking at another transfer service that has a $10 transaction fee but gives the day's actual exchange rate. Will probably only use that for large scheduled transfers.

So I guess everything is back to normal.....well, at least as "normal" as it can be at the moment.