We asked the flight stewardess about it and she said there were no cards.
Upon our arrival, someone distributed the cards as we exited the tube to the NAIA 1 terminal. As expected, we all had to stop and fill out the cards.
A slight delay, actually, but an unnecessary inconvenience.
One foreigner was making nasty remarks about Filipino inefficiency. It hurt because it was true.
Having come from Bangkok, where airport and other travel services are so efficient, my friends and I thought the shortage of arrival cards is not just inefficiency. It’s stupidity.
It’s bad enough that we cannot compete with other countries when it comes to airport facilities but we should at least make things easy for travelers. Efficiency does not cost a lot of money. All that is needed is concern and common sense.
An airport employee told us that they had run out of cards because the printing of cards was sponsored by private firms. Someone surmised that the shortage must have something to do with the recall of cards with the face of cosmetic surgeon Vicky Belo.
The next day, I called up the Bureau of Immigration to find out about the shortage of cards. After several calls to numbers that nobody answered, I was able to contact the press office. Someone who said his name was ‘John’ something and a staff in that office said the arrival cards are the responsibility of the airport office.
I called up a lawyer-friend who now works with the Manila International Airport Authority which supervises NAIA1, NAIA2 (Centennial) and NAIA3. One of MIAA’s mandates is to “ Upgrade and provide safe, efficient and reliable airport facilities for international and domestic air travel.”
He said arrival cards are the responsibility of the Bureau of Immigration. I told him BI told me it’s the Airport Authority’s responsibility so please don’t refer me back to them.
Yesterday my friend referred me to NAIA1 manager Dante Basanta, who explained that the printing of arrival cards is the responsibility of Airline Operating Council, the association of airline operators. He said the Council is the one that supplies the airlines operating in the Philippines with the cards.
The Customs Declaration Card, on the other hand, is the responsibility of the Bureau of Customs.
Basanta said both the AOC and the BOC have a tie-up with Smart Communications for the printing and supply of cards. He surmised that either AOC didn’t supply Thai Airways with the necessary travel cards or the airline failed to get the cards from AOC.
He said he will call the attention of AOC because, as we told him, the inconvenienced traveler would not bother about AOC. They will just conclude that the Philippine government is hopelessly inefficient and corrupt, it can’t even have adequate supply of arrival and customs declaration cards.
From Ana Martinez-Walz:
Greetings! I am hoping that through your column I will be able to send feedback on my recent experience at NAIA.
When I left the Philippines to live with my husband in the US, I have not had the opportunity to return to the Philippines, until recently when we decided to celebrate our seventh wedding anniversary in the Philippines.
It was barely ten seconds after stepping out of the airplane when it dawned on me why NAIA is one of the worst airports in the world.
The tube that connects the airplane to the terminal was very filthy and it smelled musty — madumi at mabaho! Surely it does not take a lot of money to clean these tubes with soap and water, does it?
After stepping out of the gate, one is greeted with glass panels that separate the waiting area from arriving passengers. One would immediately notice that these glass panels are full of streaks and fingerprints. If I may suggest: a simple water and vinegar solution can easily remove these fingerprints, just in case NAIA is so poor that it could not afford to buy glass cleaners. Again, it does not take a lot of money to maintain these glass panels so that they always look new.
I may sound like I am nitpicking, but experienced travelers who have been to airports like the ones in Singapore and Seoul DO and WILL notice these things. In Seoul, for example, there are cleaning personnel who constantly clean hand railings and glass panels so that they are free of fingerprints; drinking fountains are constantly being washed with soap and water; walls with small stains that are not even that obvious are cleaned with soap and water. I was amazed to see that at the Seoul airport, escalators and moving walk-ways which are not even carpeted are cleaned with vacuum cleaners. I don’t know if the escalators at NAIA are even cleaned at all.
I noticed that certain portions of NAIA are now carpeted. I believe these were recently installed since they were not there when I left the Philippines seven years ago. But it is disheartening to see that the carpets already look old and filthy, like they have never been cleaned since their installation. My point is, we like to renovate things but we are too lazy at maintaining them.
I am sure airport authorities are aware that proper maintenance of facilities is crucial so that passengers do not feel like they are in a cattle farm, as one blogger pointed out. But proper maintenance does not have to mean a major overhaul of facilities. It could simply be just making sure that floors are constantly shiny, trash cans visible at every corner, carpets vacuumed everyday, spider cobwebs immediately removed (yes, there are plenty of cobwebs at the airport), glass fixtures free of finger prints, etc. Again, these are propositions that we do not have to spend a lot of money on.
More to the point, there are so many eyesores inside the airport like exposed wires in the ceiling and old weighing scales in the departure area that are obviously not working anymore. I could not for the life of me understand why NAIA not just throw these old weighing scales away or stow them out of the sight of passengers.
I noticed too that the ceiling in the gate area are new, as they are now made of laminate material. They may be new, but again, they are very dirty! Is it so difficult to wipe off dust and fingerprints from these fixtures?
For such a small terminal, I would guess that NAIA has a relatively high number of cleaning personnel compared to other airports. My husband commented that labor in the Philippines may be cheap compared to more progressive countries, but our advantage on labor cost is easily washed away by inefficiency. It seems like a task that is performed by 5 people in the Philippines is performed by only one person in other countries.
Cleanliness is not the only problem at NAIA.
Departing passengers at NAIA are required to show a printed itinerary to security guards to be able to enter NAIA. While this is understandable for security reasons and crowd control, it is a very annoying hassle. I have traveled to many countries and in all the airports I have been to, I was never required to show a copy of my itinerary, except at NAIA. In my case, I needed to turn my laptop on so that I could show the security guard my itinerary. But two tourists who were behind me in the security line had no printed itinerary to show and they were obviously exasperated as they were not aware of this regulation. NAIA needs to realize that bringing a printed itinerary is not a practice in many first class airports around the world, especially since almost all passengers now use E-tickets. And note too that many foreigners try to be environment-friendly and would avoid printing documents like an itinerary, especially if they have an E-ticket. At the very least, NAIA needs to install internet kiosks at the entrance so that passengers without printed itineraries can download their itinerary to show to the security guard.
And then the security checks …
Don’t get me wrong. Security checks are very important for the safety of all passengers. But I could not understand for the life of me why we have to go through a security check three times. In the US, where airports are much bigger, much busier, and much more crowded than NAIA, passengers go through a security check just once.
The first security check is at the entrance, where bags go through X-ray machines and passengers go through a metal detector. The second security check is after going through immigration, where again, passengers go through metal detectors and bags go through X-rays.
The third security check is the most annoying and a great inconvenience. Bags are inspected before entering a cordoned area at the departure gate. This becomes an annoying inconvenience since, if you need to leave the gate to go to the restroom, or if you feel hungry and want to buy food, you have to leave the cordoned area and go through security again when you return at the gate. NAIA is the only airport I have ever been to where this type of security measure is practiced. In airports like Detroit, for example, you have restaurants, pharmacies, magazine stores, bookstores, etc. everywhere inside the airport and passengers can easily go back and forth these shops and the departure gates without being restrained by a cordoned-off area at the departure gate.
And did I mention the chairs at the departure gates? Each row of chairs can seat 5 people, but since there is only two inches of space between one row of chairs to the next, passengers tend to occupy only the end seats leaving the middle seats empty. Once the end seats are occupied, there is simply no space to squeeze through a row of seats and occupy the middle seats. This defeats the purpose of having many chairs in the departure area since many passengers just choose to remain standing. May I suggest arranging the chairs with their backs against each other so that there will be space in between chairs. Or get rid of the cordons at the departure gate, so that passengers can occupy empty seats at other gates. Remember, passengers need to be at the airport 3 freaking hours before their scheduled departure, and we need all the comfort we could get before a long-haul flight.
And I would like to mention how utterly rude some NAIA personnel could be. After immigration, passengers need to line up for the second security check. I did not know that some lines are for men only and some are for women only. There were no signs that would indicate men-only and women-only lines. A female security personnel (or an immigration agent, I am not sure) was telling people about the men- and women-only schemes, but because of the high level of background noise inside NAIA it is but natural that not everybody heard her. And then she blurted out, “Hay naku, and hirap sa ibang tao hindi marunong makinig. Nakakainis! Sinabi na nga na men only ang pila ayaw pa rin sumunod. Ang titigas ng ulo!”
Had I known that the line I was in was for men only, I would have of course immediately left the line and went to the women-only line. But there were no signs that would indicate otherwise, so I assumed it was for everybody. There was absolutely no need for the female immigration security personnel at that time (April 23, around 11:10 a.m.) to be rude!
And finally, I think the much publicized blogger’s description of NAIA being similar to a cattle farm is very apt. NAIA is so noisy. I could not understand why an announcement is made on the PA system almost every 10 seconds!! NAIA is already a very noisy and crowded place. Every 10 seconds there is an announcement reminding passengers to proceed to the departure gate after getting their boarding passes. Well, where else would we go? Granted that maybe not everybody knows this, but do they have to make this reminder every 10 freaking seconds? Again, this may sound like nitpicking. But try standing in line for 2 hours to get your boarding pass while every 10 seconds an announcement is made on the PA system … it will drive you crazy, specially at 4 in the morning!
Ana, thank you for your sober sharing of this experience. I imagine that our tourism and airport officials are not strangers to these kind of comments but I have not given up that one or two officials would listen and do something about it.
As you said, it doesn’t take lots of money to institute these common sense measures.
Ellen, is that you in blue?
Yes. Becky. That was taken by NHK’s Charmaine Deogracias. Take note how airy the airport is. The architecture made use of natural light.
Related travel topic:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/a-common-airplane-annoyance-leads-to-a-costly-brouhaha-in-the-skies-over-dc/2011/05/31/AGrlMcFH_story.html
This happens all the time. You could not eat comfortably because the guy in front of you reclined his seat so the tray is pushed closer to you.
Related travel incident:
On our trip to Bangkok, May 26, two Caucasians also had a tiff as we were boarding because both wanted to go first. One insisted that he should go first because he said, “I’m in business class.”
The other guy, bigger and tough-looking, replied, “I’m in business class too!” as he pushed his way ahead of the line.
The first guy said something like ‘… bitch.”
A fight between two arrogant white men.
I thought, why would you fight over who goes first when your seats are numbered?
Most Airports now have their airlines (ATM) like machines where booked passengers can print their own boarding passes with the selection of their preferred seats on the first take basis…and if one has booked by On line as I experienced myself, do not even have to bring my printed tickets but just present my passport and the airline clerk can print them on the terminals along with the boarding pass…with securities inspection taking so much time during travel, who needs the line ups checking in for your flight?
Suggest the NAIA officials study how the world’s bussiest Terminals do their business efficiently and keep their airports Terminal, clean and safe and pleasant place to be…
for Example the Pearson International Airports (formerly Toronto Itl) where passengers bound for U.S. already gone thru U.S. customs and immigration before boarding their flight…that if they are not eligible to travel to u.s. they don’t have to take a flight and be turned back.
What is Ace doing there? 🙂
I get a lot of comments about our airport, all of them bad, ie the worst airport in the region.
Jug, ask him.
Jug, what is so painful about those ugly comments is that we can’t refute it because it’s true. Nakaka-inis at hindi tayo makapagyabang. It’s bad for national pride.
if they want efficientcy,they should learn from the japanese how things are done over there.
yong bagong international airport nila sa nagoya arrival at departure walang hazzle,pagkain sa airport parehas lang sa labas.sa atin pagpasok mo sa airport,ginto na ang halaga,pati kape.sa nagoya airport pag labas ng arrival area,mamimili ka kong saan mo gusto mo sumakay, may mga airport buses,may train/subway trains at speedboats.walang nag hihintay na taxi para pilitin kang sumakay.lahast ng bagay nasa ayos!!!
Ang ayaw ko sa lahat sa airport natin pinipilit ako na sumakay sa taxi at kung sino-sino ang sumusunod pag labas ko pa lang ng pinto. I’m always exhausted especially after filling out the disembarkation card that custom people never read anyway, mas tinitingnan nila kung meron laman na pakipit ang passport ko. 🙂
Kahit sa Tibet, Nepal at Indian airports ay hindi ko dinanas ang harassment na dinaranas ko sa ating sariling airport.
Vic, I’m enjoying the airline (ATM) like machine in the US airports, pindot-pindot lang meron na akong boarding pass and seat. Would the same machines when installed in Pinas airports work wonders? Mas kagulo siguro, we need discipline for it to function well. Haaaay, nakakadyahe talaga sa mga visitors ang serbisyo ng ating airports.
Laban tayo talaga sa ganda kung tourist areas lang ng Thailand ang usapan. Kaso ay knockout na kaagad ang Pinas pagdating sa serbisyo ng airport natin. Isang major major reason yan kung bakit nasa Thailand at wala sa Pinas ang foreign tourists.
Pagbutihin ang pisikal na serbisyo at customs sa airport kung gusto nila na kumita ang ating turismo!
This must be a record of some sorts? My PAL flight from Singapore to Manila was late last Thursday, it was late again on the way to Gen San Friday, now, a week later its late again going back to Manila from Davao!
What is strange is that the reaction of the waiting passengers was “as usual!”
I’m just wondering, how come we have very nice roads in Samar and Pampanga, obviously we spent a lot on them, and we left out our international airport? Are these farm to market schemes in these areas making more money than tourism? If they are I stand corrected.
They have very nice roads in Pampanga because d’Putot passes through them daily. Our roads in Bataan which is her neighbor remain baku-bako. With the exception of Mt. Pinatubo, there’s also no tourism spot in Pampanga, not until she lies in her open casket like Marcos.
This column has made me finally register & share my thoughts after some time of being on the reading mode..
just wonder if its really normal in other countries that balikbayans are required to fill up the disembarkation cards coz I’ve noticed in other asian countries I have travelled that locals are not required to fill up the disembarkation cards, unlike in Pinas.
some time ago, I travelled to Ho Chi Minh and before arrival, we were informed by the stewards that there were no cards on board, we need to collect them before the immigration but when we reached there, we were told no need to fill up the cards (not sure if there was no cards because we saw some foreigners filling up, I suppose those are for visa on arrival).. this was my first so far, without the disembarkation card..
as for the long queue, I am a frequent traveller to KL via KLIA and most of the time, we would spent about 1-2 hrs queing for the immigration.. many times, I have heard other people/nationalities comparing effeciency of immigration in other asian airports.. one thing is prevalent, nothing beats SG when it comes to this.
Yes, xlp. Singapore efficiency is amazing in the standard of Filipinos.
I have been through Changi airport several times, each time I fall in love with it, but I still travel Philippine Airlines and I still go through NAIA. Just like a family member that isn’t doing well, you can’t get rid of him/her, you just hope that eventually things will get better.
Hopefully in our life times. 🙂
xlp,
The chinese passengers aren’t as friendly and patient as Filipinos, they will complain, raise a rucus even, and notice how they turn on their cellphones and make calls during landing even after the announcement not to turn on cellphones and other electronic gadgets. One time I saw a flight stewardess have a heated discussion with a passenger who was practically shouting because our plane got delayed (happened in Guangzhou). But the airports are massive, really nice though.
I believe discipline is not impossible for Filipinos, I notice we do well even locally if we have good managers, leaders, etc. As J Maxwell would put it, everything rises and falls on leadership.
Based from observation, I thinks generally, SG people complains alot, be with merit or not, but having lived in SG for few years, I somehow understand where they are coming from..
On efficiency, according to a friend when she renewed her passport here, after the passport her passport was handed to her, she attempted to ask something and the attendant said something, you should have asked earlier – I am entitled to served 3 minutes each customer, but allowed her to ask anyway.. I guess that’s explains why..
while for us, we just learned that that passport processing was extended to about 2-3 months? when one of our companions went to collect her passport after 6 weeks (originigal processing period) but when was told she need to wait for another two months.. don’t understand why is this so.. have to wait for my turn..
From Dennis Robles:
I live in California and I pity the Philippines. Just a simple distribution of airport cards yet the government doesn’t know who takes the responsibility.
The government agencies concerned don’t care because there’s no money or kickback that can be made from these cards.
The Manila International Airport is one of the worst airports in the world.
This is one of the reasons we don’t want to go there for vacations. We prefer to go to other countries where you enjoy. No hassle at all.
The President should do something about this situation. But I believe he’s just a mere figurehead and can’t make decisions on his own. Or he doesn’t care at all.
chi: (#18) On the other hand, there is a small portion of the National Highway (about 15 to 20 mtrs) that is all dirt and people living there could not stand the dust they have to wet this part with buckets of water several times a day. Where is this? Right in LUBAO – Putot’s hometown, just after passing the tricycle terminals leading to the villages. This causes long traffic snarls on weekends for travelers going to and from Bataan and Zambales.
Thank God SCTEX has been finished, I swear I will never pass that old route again.
Sagad sa pagnanakaw, sariling bayan di maperpekto ang kalsada.