[I wish i had taken pictures ... maybe next time]
People in Tacloban don't know how good they've got it when it comes to their local power distributor. LEYECO II has been a consistent performer among the country's electric cooperatives. More importantly, it's not performance only on paper but in actual service delivery.
I've had nothing but positive experiences with LEYECO II. I guess for them, good service is the rule rather than the exception. Yesterday, power went out in GSN Building and Hotel d'Angelo, both buildings owned by the Washington Trading family. The whole day of yesterday power was out consequently affecting our store's sales. Hoping that power would be restored today and sales better, we decided to close the store at 4:00PM yesterday.
When we opened today the power was still out. That's when we found out that there was something wrong with the transformers that serviced the two buildings. We decided to call up LEYECO II so that the problem/s could be fixed. By 9:00AM their boom truck arrived and starting work on removing the blown out transformers. In good customer-service practice, a LEYECO lineman came to our store to inform us that the problem was being worked on even though our store is half a block away from where they were working.
Sad to say that as of this writing, power has yet to be restored to the two affected buildings. This is understandable because they have to fix the busted transformer before they can reinstall it "power up" our buildings. My estimate is that they can restore power before evening, but i could be wrong.
There's nothing to complain about how they handled this problem. LEYECO II was responsive to our concern, they acted on the problem, and more importantly they gave us information on what was going on.
Great job! Keep it up!
Read more!
8.06.2008
Tacloban City PNP
As promised in Tacloban Cops on Duty?!, here are pictures of Tacloban City police officers Esperas and Monteza (and their lady companion) who came to our store on July 28, 2008. These are photos taken from our store security camera between 10:00 a.m. and 11:30a.m.
It makes me wonder about the award that was recently given to Tacloban City PNP as Best Urban Station. From what i saw in local TV news, it was mainly due to their community presence and relations. If we are to take out the behavior of Esperas and Monteza (as well as Sudario and Ibañez), perhaps the award is deserved. On the other hand, this is exactly the kind of police behavior that makes our local police less praiseworthy.
The story on Sudario and Ibañez
August of 2007, these two police officers came to our store. They were looking to each buy a pair of jeans. The gist of the story is that despite our best efforts to achieve a cash sale, we had to give the items to them on credit. We agreed to the credit sale based on character since these two did not leave any form of collateral. We assumed that they are persons of integrity and character and eventually would return to our store to pay their debts.
Well, it's August 2008 and to this date they have not visited our store to pay for the items that they purchased. In fact, we would often see these two policemen on duty in the area around our store. My wife even visited them a couple of times to ask when they would pay.
DO THE MATH: Given the behavior of these Tacloban City police officers... ADD ...the fact that Tacloban City PNP was awarded Best Urban Station ... CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW TACLOBAN CITY POLICE OFFICERS ARE AT THEIR WORST?
I wonder if the local city police officials (and the local chief executive) have any idea what kind of petty abuse that street police do in the community.
Read more!
It makes me wonder about the award that was recently given to Tacloban City PNP as Best Urban Station. From what i saw in local TV news, it was mainly due to their community presence and relations. If we are to take out the behavior of Esperas and Monteza (as well as Sudario and Ibañez), perhaps the award is deserved. On the other hand, this is exactly the kind of police behavior that makes our local police less praiseworthy.
The story on Sudario and Ibañez
August of 2007, these two police officers came to our store. They were looking to each buy a pair of jeans. The gist of the story is that despite our best efforts to achieve a cash sale, we had to give the items to them on credit. We agreed to the credit sale based on character since these two did not leave any form of collateral. We assumed that they are persons of integrity and character and eventually would return to our store to pay their debts.
Well, it's August 2008 and to this date they have not visited our store to pay for the items that they purchased. In fact, we would often see these two policemen on duty in the area around our store. My wife even visited them a couple of times to ask when they would pay.
DO THE MATH: Given the behavior of these Tacloban City police officers... ADD ...the fact that Tacloban City PNP was awarded Best Urban Station ... CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW TACLOBAN CITY POLICE OFFICERS ARE AT THEIR WORST?
I wonder if the local city police officials (and the local chief executive) have any idea what kind of petty abuse that street police do in the community.
Read more!
8.03.2008
Tacloban Cops on Duty?!
This is a first for me in our store! We've had local police officers visit our store many times in the past. But these two (and their lady companion) are a breed apart.
From what their nameplates say, these two policemen are Esperas and Monteza. I don't know how to read the different insignia on their uniforms so i couldn't determine their rank. These photos were taken off our store security camera on 29 July 2008, a day after their first visit to the store. It was their visit the day before that's the real story.
On 28 July 2008, these two policemen together with a lady companion came to our store in the morning. They wanted to buy several pairs of denim jeans that we sell at Php380 each. They wanted to buy the jeans at Php300; we couldn't go that low since that would mean a loss for us. So instead we offered them a final price of Php350 per pair - a price that is still lower than our final price of Php360.
I guess they really wanted the jeans so they agreed to our offer of Php350. Interestingly, as they were leaving the store their lady companion left behind a few threatening remarks. She told Esperas and Monteza to tell the other policemen on duty around the block to come to our store and conduct sidewalk clearing operations. This means that our store would have to remove our sidewalk display or else the policemen would confiscate them.
True to her word, the policemen on duty visited us late in the afternoon and asked us to remove our sidewalk display. I have no problem with policemen asking us to remove our sidewalk display - i have always assumed that these are part of legitimate sidewalk clearing operations. This was the first time I experienced such an unbelievable coincidence: policemen visit our store in the morning, couldn't buy items at the price they wanted, threatened to ask other policemen on duty to conduct sidewalk clearing operations, and then in the afternoon, a sidewalk clearing operation happens. What a coincidence!
This incident has made me think twice about my respect for our police officers in Tacloban. My dealings with several policemen in the past have always been reasonable and respectful. I find that a lot of policemen in Tacloban are reasonable and respectful of citizens and in turn really deserve our respect for their authority. This incident, however, shook my respect for them. That they can threaten any establishment on a whim and by coincidence the threat is carried out later in the day is scary.
It makes me apprehensive about policemen visiting our store. Who knows what they will ask for next time. Who knows what they will threaten us with next time. It's too hard to imagine.
But this is not the first time that we have been visited by policemen who were not too subtle about their being policemen when it came to their purchases. The case of Sudario and Ibañez is a different story. More on that in another post. More photos on Esperas and Monteza from our security cameras in a future post too. Read more!
From what their nameplates say, these two policemen are Esperas and Monteza. I don't know how to read the different insignia on their uniforms so i couldn't determine their rank. These photos were taken off our store security camera on 29 July 2008, a day after their first visit to the store. It was their visit the day before that's the real story.
On 28 July 2008, these two policemen together with a lady companion came to our store in the morning. They wanted to buy several pairs of denim jeans that we sell at Php380 each. They wanted to buy the jeans at Php300; we couldn't go that low since that would mean a loss for us. So instead we offered them a final price of Php350 per pair - a price that is still lower than our final price of Php360.
I guess they really wanted the jeans so they agreed to our offer of Php350. Interestingly, as they were leaving the store their lady companion left behind a few threatening remarks. She told Esperas and Monteza to tell the other policemen on duty around the block to come to our store and conduct sidewalk clearing operations. This means that our store would have to remove our sidewalk display or else the policemen would confiscate them.
True to her word, the policemen on duty visited us late in the afternoon and asked us to remove our sidewalk display. I have no problem with policemen asking us to remove our sidewalk display - i have always assumed that these are part of legitimate sidewalk clearing operations. This was the first time I experienced such an unbelievable coincidence: policemen visit our store in the morning, couldn't buy items at the price they wanted, threatened to ask other policemen on duty to conduct sidewalk clearing operations, and then in the afternoon, a sidewalk clearing operation happens. What a coincidence!
This incident has made me think twice about my respect for our police officers in Tacloban. My dealings with several policemen in the past have always been reasonable and respectful. I find that a lot of policemen in Tacloban are reasonable and respectful of citizens and in turn really deserve our respect for their authority. This incident, however, shook my respect for them. That they can threaten any establishment on a whim and by coincidence the threat is carried out later in the day is scary.
It makes me apprehensive about policemen visiting our store. Who knows what they will ask for next time. Who knows what they will threaten us with next time. It's too hard to imagine.
But this is not the first time that we have been visited by policemen who were not too subtle about their being policemen when it came to their purchases. The case of Sudario and Ibañez is a different story. More on that in another post. More photos on Esperas and Monteza from our security cameras in a future post too. Read more!
7.31.2008
Starting over!
It has been quite some time. A while back i put up a couple of blogs, each for a different purpose. Then i got busy and lost track of some of them. In fact, some i neglected for such a long time i hadn't posted anything for over a year. Finally, i decided to delete most of them and kept only two. I decided to re-spawn "speakeasy".
What i did was to delete my old "speakeasy" blog, and then recreate it. This was the fastest way to get rid of all my old posts and start with a "blank page" so to speak. No promises ... but i will try to post regularly. Read more!
What i did was to delete my old "speakeasy" blog, and then recreate it. This was the fastest way to get rid of all my old posts and start with a "blank page" so to speak. No promises ... but i will try to post regularly. Read more!
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