Scam at the U.S. Embassy in Manila

At the U.S. Embassy in Manila you go through a checkpoint and they take your cell phone etc., put it in a bin and give you a number which you give back to them to retrieve your stuff. My wife went there for the first time to pick up my passport and a guard told her before she entered the building that she couldn't take a cell phone inside and she would have to leave it with a nearby woman (not in a uniform) for 200 pesos. The woman gave her a number and upon my wife's exit the woman returned the phone from a bag of phones she had collected. Think of the amount of money these two are scamming daily. I don't have the email address of the U.S. Embassy but if anyone has it send it to me so I can let them know what their personnel are up to. LOL only in the Philippines...

 

Have you been to the embassy before? That is not the procedure or how the embassy entrance works. It could not have happened inside the embassy grounds by an embassy employees. No way.

 

I second that Pat, anyone trying something like that right outside the embassy entrance would get busted in short order. They have too many eyes and cameras around that place.

 

If you had done any homework at all, you would know that cell phones are no longer allowed inside the embassy, period. There is no longer a place to deposit your phone inside the embassy. It has been this way for at least a year or two. The guard is instructed to turn away anyone who presents themself with a cell phone. This means that your wife should have been sent packing without any other options, or throw her phone away. Instead, out of kindness the guard opted to refer her to someone who may store her phone for a fee.

You are complaining because he gave her the option?

Larry

It appears it has been that way for 5 years, since 2007;

http://www.theworldoffilipinas.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4884

 

Been there twice the last year and turned in the phones and picked them up on the way out.

 

Non US citizens do not have that option.

Larry

 

I never liked doing homework but my experience differs. I've been there twice within the past two years and they took my phone inside as described and returned it to me when I left. I would like a piece of the guard's action you describe as kindness. He and his Honey are making a tidy daily sum. Your website is directed to visa applicants. "Visa applicants are no longer permitted to bring cell phones or other electronic devices into the U.S. Embassy Consular Section. Effective March 1, 2007." The guard knew she was not a "visa applicant". If you notice the huge visa applicant crowd when you visit you will see there is money to be made by this process. Care to modify your response?

 

My response was in haste, but based on what we have been telling visa clients for several years. Although she is not a visa applicant, from your post I can also assume she is not a US citizen. The guard too was probably acting out of habit to the 300 Filipinos per day that show up with cell phone in hand.

Larry

 

The VA requires you to leave your phone.

For free

 

Larry,
300 visa applicants a day you say? Hmmmm at 200p per phone that would be 200p x 300= hmmmm. How about you and I take a duffel bag full of printed number cards to Manila?. We can offer a discount to anyone under 5 feet tall and work in shifts.