Machine readable passports? When?

There was this sentence somewhere in the middle of Ate Glue’s SONA which reads: "Machine readable electronic passports will enhance the credibility of Philippine travel documents, improve the mobility and increase the prospects of Philippine business and labor."

Technically, Ate Glue did not promise that we will have those passports. She merely said they are nice to have. That’s probably why she didn’t give the Department of Foreign Affairs a deadline on when to start producing these passports. Actually, we are late. Most countries who know what is good for their citizens have been giving them machine readable passports for years.

Still, if you were listening to Ate Glue, as I was, when she read that sentence on machine readable passports, you would get the impression that she is about to deliver the goods to us soon. Dream on, you stupid gullible citizens out there who applauded her with gusto, here is one more promise Ate Glue is making and is not about to deliver anytime soon. The project was signed in February 2001 by then acting Secretary Lauro Baja Jr. But more than five years later, the DFA is still issuing passports with handwritten personal information of the passport holder.

The Philippines, according to news reports, has the dubious distinction of being the only member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that can’t issue machine-readable passports. Apparently, even Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are better off. A machine-readable passport contains biographical data and digital photo. Two lines of text appear at the bottom of the page. It is read by swiping through a machine reader connected to a computer. There’s nothing really too high tech about it.

When I last talked to Foreign Office spokesman Bert Asuque, he couldn’t tell me anything definite. He gave me the impression that the machine readable passport project is in a state of limbo. My Tito Bert Romulo (he is my late mother’s second cousin from Camiling, Tarlac) cancelled the BOT contract for it, against the advice of DFA’s lawyers, including an undersecretary. My Tito Bert must have good reasons for doing what he did, but I am worried the practical consequence of the cancellation is an even more horrendous delay.

As it stands today, the DFA’s machine readable passport project is going the way of NAIA 3. I read some press releases that the BOT contractor is set to tie the project up in legal knots that cannot be untangled for years. Just look at NAIA 3 and prepare to lose hope that we will see any machine readable passport issued by this government any time soon… maybe not even before 2010. I don’t see any sense of urgency in DFA officials, including my beloved Tito Bert, in fast tracking a solution to the problem at hand.

For a country whose economy is dependent on migrant labor, a machine readable passport is essential. This is made even more so, because our current passports are easily counterfeited and as such in this age of terrorism, looked upon as something just a bit better than toilet paper in immigration counters abroad. How many times have Philippine passport holders been segregated at border crossings and airports abroad and their passports examined meticulously?

Until my dear Tito Bert makes a very clear announcement of the deadline for the delivery of these machine readable passports, a deadline on which he would stake his continued stay in office, Ate Glue was just making an empty promise in her SONA last Monday. Until then, we have to get used to the insulting looks of immigration officers whenever we present our outdated, easily counterfeited Philippine passports.

Outsourcing

I got this e-mail from A.M. Santos, who was reacting to past columns which tackled the problems of medical transcription, a popular outsourcing business.

I read with great interest your column regarding the status of the Philippine medical transcription (MT) industry. I believe you may have been slightly misinformed when you stated that the problem of the industry is the lack of medical transcriptionists. The statement made should have been, the problem of the industry is the lack of WELL TRAINED medical transcriptionists.  

There is no shortage of MTs evident with the proliferation of MT schools all over the Metro and all over the country. MT schools have become a very profitable business (especially for franchise owners), but is bringing havoc to the whole Philippine MT industry.

I have been in medical transcription for over five years now; doing medical reports for firms in the US and UK. For a number of years, I had been training my MTs in-house and it cost me a lot of money because unlike the call center industry, a good MT needs at least two to four months of training to become "production ready". This is an estimated training cost of P70,000.00 to P90,000.00 per MT which MTSO owners like myself have to absorb. 

So, when I first learned about the opening of MT schools, I was very happy.    It was like my prayers were answered …having to hire MTs without any cost.  Thus, you can picture my dismay when I started to hire the graduates and they failed to produce high quality reports. Their English was horrendous and they were not even touch typists (a necessity for their occupational health and safety).   I was further disappointed when these inadequately trained graduates were demanding salary ranges at P25,000-75,000 because this was what their school had told them.

It is no wonder why medical transcription service offices (MTSO) are closing at a rate of 3-5 every two months. Their business model of poaching "senior" MTs to edit the work of the fresh graduates is a formula for failure. These "senior" MT do nothing all day but edit error-filled reports. Given the sheer volume of errors, the possibility of producing a good report is like finding a needle in a haystack. Failure to produce 99 percent accurate reports is grounds for clients to terminate their contract.   

Thus, the MTSO owner will lose his P3.5M investment in medial transcription in a span of 6 months to 1 year (if they are lucky to last this long). I would like to appeal to the owners of MT schools. Being educators, you have a social responsibility to properly train your students by providing them with the skills necessary for them to be successful in their chosen career. You need to put education ahead of your profits.   Business is supposed to have a soul.

I’m sorry if this turned out to be quite lengthy. I just needed to vent out my frustration.  I hope you will be able to publish this and shed light on the truth in medical transcription.

Text spam

Why am I getting text spam from Citifinance? Why is Globe allowing this? I thought the NTC banned this thing from annoying paying subscribers.

Calling the attention of NTC Chairman Pope Solis.

A war story

PhilStar reader Lal Chatlani sent in this anniversary treat.

An elderly Italian man who lived on the outskirts of Monte Casino went to the local church for confession.  When the priest slid open the panel in the confessional, the man said, "Father, during World War II, a beautiful woman knocked on my door and asked me to hide her from the enemy. So I hid her in my attic."

The priest replied, "That was a wonderful thing you did, my son! And you have no need to confess that."

"It’s worse than that, father. She started to repay me with sexual favors."

The priest said, "By doing that, you were both in great danger. However, two people under those circumstances can be very tempted to act that way. But if you are truly sorry for your actions, you are indeed forgiven."

"Thank you, Father. That’s a great load off my mind. But I do have one more question."

"And what is that?" asked the priest.

"Should I tell her the war is over?"

Boo Chanco’s e-mail address is [email protected]