The Lady Programmer

Several times I have experienced losing cash to unscrupulous individuals. When I was still employed with a company, I have experienced losing a month’s worth paycheck for about three times. In one of those instances when I lost my wallet to a group of pickpocket criminals while crossing a busy street, I lost a significant amount of cash within that wallet, but the ATM debit cards and IDs still remained in that wallet. The wallet was found by someone else and because of those remaining debit and IDs, that wallet was still returned back to me.

Since then, I decided to use ATM debit cards to pay for higher priced items, depending on the store’s minimum price. In SM Baguio, the minimum payment accepted in their department store is only P100. Other merchants accept P200 as their minimum amount of purchase. To be sure, ask the merchant.

Here are my reasons for using ATM cards:
1. Widely accepted by many merchants. Many mall shops, groceries, hotels and restaurants accept card payments. In my locality, even shops and restaurants that are located out from the mainstream customers even accepts these card payments.
2. Easier to carry than cash. Cash is easily lost to pickpockets and holdups. I think it is better to carry cash to pay for lower priced items under P100 or P200.
3. Less likely to be taken by street robbers. In the Philippines the petty thieves are often interested more in taking cellphones and cash away from the victims. Most street robbers in the Philippines are not too well versed on cracking the code particularly on ATM debit cards because these are secured by PINs.
4. Makes it easier to keep track of transactions. Many Pinoys are now gaining access to the internet. Internet cafes at the neighborhood is fast becoming a trend. Offices are almost always connected to the network and the internet. DSL is now a service available to middle-class consumers.
5. Avoid being robbed after a withdrawal. There are many incidences when an individual is robbed of cash after doing a withdrawal.
6. Avoid long lines at ATMs. Long lines can be quite a hassle and is not secure. After all, many merchants already accept card payments anyway.

photo credit: pipp (SXC)

Hence, using ATM debit cards is also a great advantage over cash especially at higher amounts, so I think this is a good option to go for – at least for a while that majority of the criminals are not yet aware on how to take advantage of these.

UPDATED: February 18, 2009

The Payoneer virtual bank account is NOT yet offered to all cardholders. This facility is currently under pilot stage where few selected account holders were invited to take part in this new service that will be out soon. To learn more about Payoneer, click to my experience on receiving my Payoneer card.

Here is great news to Payoneer card account holders: Payoneer will be offering virtual bank account services. Payoneer cards of account holders will have the option to avail of a virtual bank account with its issuer First Bank of Delaware Metabank. This opens up more possibilities of loading the card – such as doing a Paypal to Payoneer transfer.

I am using an oDesk Mastercard which is powered by Payoneer. I will not be depended on oDesk to fund my oDesk Mastercard to fund it because I have Paypal to Payoneer transfer as another option to load my oDesk Mastercard.

Payoneer virtual bank account with SERVICES menu enabled

I got the invitation from Payoneer to participate in this pilot program through email, and after some email exchanges I had agreed to participate in their program. The first thing I had noticed is that the SERVICES menu which was normally disabled is now enabled – that was where I saw the virtual bank account service which contained the account number and the bank routing number.

Payoneer virtual bank account

I added up a new bank account in Paypal. Then I decided to send a test amount of $13.90 from my Paypal account. Paypal processed it in their system for one day, a normal occurence to anyone initiating a bank account withdrawal. I received those funds in my Payoneer account after another day. The duration of the entire Paypal to Payoneer transfer was only two business days. I made several transfers and unless there are bank holidays, I often get the funds into my account in just two business days.

Aside from that fast transfer, I think Payoneer has a superb customer service – I had already used their live chat assistance for inquiries and account problems.

The only downside to using Payoneer cards are the loads of fees that are being charged when one uses the card. I hope this post on how to save more from Payoneer withdrawals can help on how to minimize Payoneer fees. Nevertheless, I still want to keep Payoneer as another option to withdraw earnings online just in case my Paypal account fails.

I tried to compare the exchange rates of Paypal and Payoneer to check which of these give better exchange rate. Payoneer puts on a 1 to 3% currency conversion fee as dictated by Mastercard, while Paypal puts on a 2.5% currency conversion rate on top of their wholesale exchange rate.

I got into my personal accounts at Paypal and Payoneer and tried to make a tally of the transactions where currency change was in effect. In Paypal, there is an exchange of currency when I decide to withdraw funds to my bank account. Payoneer, being a Mastercard, a change of currency occurs when I decide to withdraw funds from an ATM or decide to purchase an item off a store with a different currency other than the US dollar.

Here is the comparison between Philippine Peso and US Dollar exchange rate (I’m just simply shy to show you the withdrawal transactions). Exchange rate = value in pesos/value in dollars
There are three observations that I have noted from this data:

1. In Payoneer, higher Peso exchange rate is seen when items are bought off purchase than that by cash withdrawals.
2. In Payoneer, there is no fixed exchange rate of the day: it varies a lot – the transactions worth Php 184.60, Php 1084.00 and Php 418.35 were all card purchases done in a single day.
3. At a glance, there seems to be no huge difference between the exchange rates of both payment methods.

The data could have been quite accurate if I had been able to get data that spans for several transactions: However, I have just gotten my Paypal verified only last month.

Overall, it seems to me that the exchange rate for both methods does not differ much from each other, so using any of these two payment methods would be great. Remember that if you are trying to purchase in US dollars then currency conversion fees does not apply to both Paypal and Payoneer.

Are you still waiting for your Payoneer Mastercard? Do you even have a Paypal account that seems to be taking forever to get verified? Enter Moneybookers: it is an another payment method available to oDesk providers to withdraw their hard-earned funds right into their favorite Philippine bank account.

For oDesk newbies, Moneybookers is the most accessible way for them to withdraw cash, if the first two recommended payment methods that I had recommended are not available. The withdrawal process is actually done by electronic bank transfers. The banks that benefits most are those that are connected with the SWIFT network of banks.

In reality, I have not tried withdrawing my funds from oDesk using this method, but I believe the overall concept works similarly to Paypal. Moneybookers can be a “wallet” for shopping to many internet sites. It can receive funds and send these through electronic transfers to the bank. There are also fees associated with the withdrawal of funds from Moneybookers to the bank account. These fees are:

• Withdraw money via bank transfer: € 1.80 flat fee
• Withdraw money via cheque: € 3.50 flat fee
• Withdraw money via credit/debit card (Visa only): € 1.80 flat fee

In Paypal, the minimum withdrawal amount is fixed at $10, while Moneybookers does not impose a minimum limit, but the funds that should be left should cover the incoming fund transfer fee of local banks. This incoming fee is different in Philippine banks, so it is a good option to ask their customer support.

• BDO incoming EFT = P200 (BDO customer support)
• Unionbank EON incoming EFT = none (UBP customer support)

If you need to add the bank accounts to your Moneybookers account, you will need the SWIFT codes for this – SWIFT codes vary per branch – so it is a good decision to ask your branch about the SWIFT code. Fortunately for BDO, Unionbank and Landbank, all their branches uses a common SWIFT code:

• BDO SWIFT code = BNORPHMM (given by BDO customer support through a phone call)
• Unionbank SWIFT code =UBPHPHMM (UBP customer support through a phone call)
• Landbank SWIFT code = TLBPPHMMXXX (listed on Landbank website)

I find this payment method an interesting option but the fees involved is more expensive than using Paypal. I get to pay only P50 for every withdrawal from Paypal if the amount is less than P7000; otherwise beyond P7000 withdrawals are always free of charge. Paypal and Moneybookers takes the same amount of time to withdraw funds to a bank account. I will surely use Moneybookers in case I encounter problems with Paypal.

But what about Payoneer? As I have mentioned in a previous post, this provides the fastest and most convenient fund transfer even if you opt not to pay the $3 immediate load fee. The fees associated with the use of the card will dependent on many factors: immediate load fee, withdrawals, ATM withdrawal limits are some that will add more to fees. Oftentimes I use the card itself for purchases rather than withdrawing the amount loaded to it.

You can sign up with Moneybookers by clicking the banner below:

photo credit: woodsy (SXC)

As a Filipino living life here in the Philippines, I noticed that the majority still uses cash for payment. These majority think that cash is the safest, most secure means of payment. In my family alone, my parents prefer using cash as their payment means, rather than using their ATM or debit cards for store purchases. However, there are already so many major establishments that accept credit and debit cards and even cellphone wallet funds as payment means in addition to cash.

I cannot help but ponder on the irony that is happening in our country: there are many graduates of IT, Engineering and other computer-related courses who knows the most upbeat technology in the world. The funny thing is that, a vast majority of Filipinos are still resistant to change. In groceries, I still observe that many are still lining up in groceries and pays in cash; ATM machines contain long queues of people who need to take out cash; older people even prefer getting pension checks, rather than using issued e-cards which expedites the process; even in other freelancing sites, I receive numerous questions on how payments are received and whether these are “secure”, reliable and credible.

Probably, the main fear that results from these electronic payments is that there is no paper trail that can be traced on how transactions are being done. I always hear plenty of horror stories around it – for example, in using ATM cards, sometimes account is debited but there was no cash withdrawn. However, there are still electronic databases (with ample backups) that will truly record every transaction made with the bank – this will rectify any error that was made.

Come to think of it, these same set of Filipinos receive remittances confidently mostly through banks and other express remittance methods – these all the same work with the same electronic transferring means that fuels our own debit and credit cards.

Filipinos should be open-minded with these alternative methods. Carrying cash around is not also very secure – in fact, carrying plenty of it is a lot of risk to street thieves. Carrying an ample amount (not too much) on a single card can be a better way to purchase things and avoid the long ATM queues and offline problems.