Credit Card Woes

For years now, I have been living life without that plastic called a credit card sought after by most people. There was only a time when I had a BPI Express Credit card mailed to me by BPI since I have two bank accounts with them.

I used that card for at least a year then deactivated it not wanting to pay for the annual fee of P1200.

Twice, in my "past life" I received a card from AIG sent to my office. The first one was due to an officemate who referred me. The second time was when the unethical head of Human Resources gave the list of employees to AIG (I found this out when I asked the AIG agent how they got my contact number and how come all of my officemates received one)

Both cards I didn't activate unlike my officemates. Because of this I got a call from a lady working for AMI, some sort of market intelligence company, who visited me in the office, interviewed me why didn't I activate the cards sent to me, unlike almost everybody else. So many questions asked that I simply answered I don't need one, I still prefer cash even the occasional cash purchases. The lady even ask my opinion on how can they sign me up for a card. I said, I don't really need one. The lady just told me I'm "one of a kind."

That lady was actually pretty and so my officemates asked me why I was interviewed? I told them why and asked me if they could be interviewed too plus the freebie mug I was given as gratitude for taking a few minutes of my time.

Years later, I now tried to apply for a Citibank credit card upon the suggestion of a friend when she learned I was contemplating on applying for one. I needed one to use for an upcoming trip to Hong Kong for I wanted to avoid usual $100 deposit at the hotel if I don't have a card.

A day after I was informed by a friend, her friend from Citibank called me up in the office and sent me the application form through a courier, who asked me to sign the form and submit a copy of my payslips, income tax return and company ID.

After a few days, I got numerous calls from their guys asking me for information on this and that even asked for his calls to be transferred to our personnel administration office to verify something. The guy even called up my home phone to verify the information I submitted.

My Hong kong trip was nearing so I tried to follow my application with my friend who in turn followed it up from her friend at Citibank where I was told the application was already approved and just wait for a few days.

Another week went by and I just got a letter from Citibank that my application was not approved for unknown reasons.

I just shrugged the whole thing off thinking it's Citibank's loss and not mine. I don't know how the risk management guys of Citibank were thinking but I find them stupid. Yes, S-T-U-P-I-D stupid!

I'm not sour graping. I still can't imagine why I was denied even without a bad record in my name, a respectable amount in my three bank accounts many times the initial credit limit they told me, and a salary of a management level employee and yet they denied me.

In the letter, they informed me I could try again after six months. Oh no, Citibank, don't expect me to cross paths with your stupid people again.

For now, I continue living without that plastic card and loving it!

Image Spam Then, Now PDF Spam

Months ago I noticed a surge in spammers sending me images with legit looking words in email body to defeat anti-spam tools.

Now, there's a plenty of them spam, this time as PDF files, received by my inbox. Most of the filenames even have my name on them as if it's really for me.

Since I know they're spam, I just mark them as spam until my email client or webmail tags messages like it as junk mail.

ATM Fees and Charges in the Philippines

Here's an example of a politician ranting incorrectly about an issue he barely understands: the claim of outrageous ATM fees earned by Philippine banks

The story, available online at CIBAC site in Filipino lambasts banks charging atm transaction fees on withdrawal, balance inquiries and others but failed to mention that the fees are only applicable when the cardholder decided to use the ATMs other than his own banks

There are no charges for using your own bank's ATM. However, the cardholder will be charged P1 or P2 for balance Inquiries, P8 to P11 for cash withdrawals and about P25 for funds transfers between banks. That is what you call ATM convenience fees. The cardholder has the option to use his own bank's ATM but in order to do, transportation may be needed as well as time and the risk involved.

The ones charging the cardholder are actually the three networks that allow such setup to happen: BancNet Expressnet and Megalink. These three need the convenience fees collected to survive. That's simple economics.

Lots of politicians suffer from selective amnesia in their desire to get media mileage in this country.

Update (as of November 2007):

Current Fees and Charges of ATM transactions in the Philippines

Commentary on the Human Security Act of 2007 (Anti-Terrorism Law)

I've been reading so much protests against a law, direly needed by this terrorists-laden country, that still hasn't been implemented due to ignorance of our law enforcers about it's provisions and built-in safety nets against abuse.

Ever present militants, always quick to point out "flaws" and invitation to abuse against "legitimate dissent" presenting scenarios of abuse by the crooked members of the police and military, but always fail to present the safety nets to guard against abusers and wrongful detention clearly indicated in the law.

For example, reading sections 7 and 8 of the law, various activities can't be done without permission from the Court of Appeals, an institution I still respect. But if people no longer hold the CA in respect, separate from the unpopular executive branch of government, then I understand why people raise a howl of protest against the law.

This government has dismal record in guarding against human rights but I don't believe GMA has a direct hand in all of them. GMA merely is powerless to do anything against the perpetrators either she has lost her control over the armed forces or people who should be able to help either kept silent or silenced forever.

During my trip to Singapore (blog post here), the Asia-Pacific Financial Crimes Conference, the Philippines was singled out as the weakest link in the region's fight against terrorism due to it's weak military and absence of anti-terror law. (Not that I only knew of it during my Singapore trip but I welcome the news of its filing in Congress, delayed, passed and delayed implementation after the midterm elections.)

The government and the Filipino people, with a sword of Damocles hanging over our heads in the form of terrorists who kill and bomb and maim innocent civilians, need to be fought with punitive actions and a law to arm them well.

Militants fighting the law's implementation should give it the benefit of the doubt; if it's abused by the powers-that-be, use the law's provisions against abusers with stiff penalties stated there.

I feel the pain of bombing victims more when I learn that savage people behind the dastardly acts were once arrested, detained, but later set free after posting bail.

The law may be draconian and Big Brotherish but I believe it's really needed by the government in it's fight, actually the people's firght, against all acts or terror.

HSA is there to contain the plague of humanity-- for terrorists not to see the light of day-- never to kill, maim and bomb again another day.

Read the full text of Republic Act 9372: Human Security Act here.