Escalating crime wave bad for business

A lot of businessmen are getting jittery over the escalating crime wave in Metro Manila over the past two weeks. One prominent victim of a car jacking is the cousin of Mar Roxas, restaurateur and Cibo owner Gaita Fores whose Toyota Land Cruiser was forcibly taken by two men from her driver the other night.  There is also the high profile gruesome killings of Emerson Lozano (the son of lawyer Oliver Lozano) and Venson Evangelista, a car dealer’s son.

More business people are bracing to arm themselves especially car dealers due to the recent incidents of carnappings and murders, with the news reverberating in Asian newspapers once again painting the Philippines as an unsafe country. A former US law enforcement agent visiting the Philippines suggested that more undercover police agents be deployed to try and trap these criminals in their own game. The high-profile killings has prompted former reporter Armand Dean Nocum (who with his wife Ann was active in the used car selling business) to share some practical safety tips for people planning to sell their cars which we have slightly edi-ted due to space constraints.

1.  When contacted by buyers by phone or through the Internet, always get their address or their telephone numbers which you can call back to verify if their claims are true. Checking their names on Facebook or other social sites would be helpful.

2. When meeting them at your house, always get some people to witness the meeting. Having their faces captured on a CCTV camera is ideal (if you have one) but getting someone to photograph them secretly during the meeting would do no harm. Doing so would make you look paranoid but it is better to be paranoid than dead. You can also take pictures of them inspecting the car, explaining that you are just taking picture of a car you hate to miss.

3. When they want to do test drives, insist that they leave government identification cards like license, SSS, PhilHealth, gun license and other cards which cannot be faked. If they come by car, insist they leave it behind and check if it is really registered under their name and not a stolen one. If they come in pairs, ask one of them to stay in your place.

4. Conduct the test drive at daytime and only within your subdivision or places you are familiar with in places where people abound. Watch out for vehicles following you. Always do the test drive at daytime. Meeting them at night or outside your home is out of the question except if you are acquainted with them.

5.  If you really must meet them outside, do so in a place with CCTV cameras and have a companion in a back-up car take their pictures (if the glasses of your backup car is tinted). Always bring a back-up car to tag along during the test drive and make them aware you are bringing one. Again, better paranoid than sorry.

6.  In these dangerous times and if you have a choice, sell your cars to friends and acquaintances or through referrals from them and not to total strangers to lessen the exposure and risk. In the used car business, it is the trust that matters more than the cars.

 Costly insurance

News about President Noy’s “new” third-hand Porsche has stirred up interest for high-end, luxury vehicles. But other than the purchase price, what car owners are concerned with are the insurance costs, with the Mercedes Benz SL65 AMG roadster said to be the most expensive to insure in 2011 at more than $3,500 according to Insure.com. Number 2 on the list is the BMW 750i, followed by the 750 Li. Porsche’s two-door 911 Carrera S comes in at number 8.

On the other hand, the list of the least expensive cars to insure is topped by the Chrysler Town and Country LX at $ 1,091 followed by the Toyota Sienna at $1,100. Of course, a big factor considered by insurance companies in determining insurance rates has to do with a car model’s “loss history” – or how severe and how often claims are filed by drivers for a particular car model.  Which is why flashy cars known for speed and those usually chosen by young drivers have higher insurance costs.

Spy tidbits

 –– Warning to fast food employees: Don’t be too helpful even with well-known celebrities or athletes, or you might suffer the same fate as a McDonald’s employee. An assistant manager working the late night shift at a McDonald’s store in the US got fired for allowing NFL star Adrian Peterson (of the Minnesota Vikings) to take a bathroom break around 3:00 a.m. – when the area is supposed to be closed to customers. The employee she let the athlete in since she knew him better than the maintenance people who get in and out of the store – but she never thought her act of kindness would get her fired. Bloggers lambasted the food chain when the story came out, calling the decision to fire the employee “randomly ridiculous.” Fortunately, the pressure from media and the social networks compelled the fast-food chain to rehire the employee.  

 –– The devastating floods in Australia, Brazil, Indonesia at this time is surprising but now we see floods in – of all places in the world – Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Although no deaths have been reported so far, the flash floods brought by the onset of heavy rains in Jeddah caused schools to be closed, with traffic turning chaotic as underpasses were submerged in floodwater. Several roads and bridges were also damaged on account of the heavy downpour, with a village along the city’s outskirts totally cut off from the main roads. With climate change most likely the reason, Jeddah was hit with a flash flood in November 2009 killing more than a hundred people and thousands of vehicles and houses destroyed.  

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