Bayan Na

Copyright © 2015-2020 by VeryWellAged

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Notice:
This story is connected to material from Jake ~ The Philippines Joyfully and Retirement and assumes you are familiar with that material.

Prologue

It was a nice looking store. Its modern exterior design was a hint of what I would find inside. What I could not know then was how much my life would change because of it.

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My name is Gordon. I am no celebrity, no matinee idol, and not wealthy. Oh, I do OK financially, what with my retirement income and the minuscule amount I get from Social Security. Moving to the Philippines was my way of assuring myself that I could live in the style I had become accustomed to in the USA, up until I retired.

It has pretty much worked out just fine in that way. My wife of ten years, a Filipina, who I had met on a business trip to the Philippines, way back when, and I, sold the condo we had outside Chicago. With the savings, we are building a home here. Jana and I have a good marriage. We have no kids. Jana had a hysterectomy due to undiagnosed endometriosis. But Jana has been there for me, at all times and, in all ways.

I do still lust after just about any good looking skirt I see. Jana knows this, much to her unhappiness but, as much as I do lust, I have not followed through. Our marriage has been without any outside stuff.

While we lived in the USA, it was not really an issue. The 'good looking skirts' I lusted after would never have given me the time of day. Living in the Philippines, it's a different story. Jana had not connected with that reality, prior to our move. It had been ten years since she had lived here. But now, now that we have made the move, she has been on edge a lot of the time, fearful that I will take up with a younger, prettier woman. To the extent that younger, pretty females are flirting with me, I guess I can see the basis for her concern.

There are a number of reasons why I am not willing to fool around. First and foremost is that I am afraid Jana will leave me. I can't abide the thought. The second is far less romantic. The land we own here, the house we are building, the vehicle we have purchased, are all in her name. I am not a citizen here and so everything we have here, and all the money I have sunk into this place, is in Jana's name. If she leaves, I am screwed, and not in a good way. The last reason I have been staying monogamous is that, while I might want to play around, I can't see anyone replacing Jana in my heart.

Still, Jana has been, and remains, on edge.

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The house we are building is, I guess, about half finished. In the end it will be about 400 Square meters (SqM) and two stories. We are putting up the roof now, and putting up the walls on the second floor. Some months ago we had selected the fixtures we wanted for the four CR's¹, kitchen, dirty-kitchen², and wash room.

We weren't ready for them at that time but, we wanted to know the sizes and space we need to accommodate as we build. Each sink has a different depth from the wall side to the counter edge. Toilets aren't as much of an issue as to offset from the wall but, the size and shape of the bowl is important should we have a cramped space. A Jacuzzi tub must be accommodated next to a shower. I need to make sure the drain for the tub is in the right place and that I have room for the shower. Building first and selecting later is a bad idea.

So had we put approximately 50% down and reserved the items we wanted. Now we are ready to take delivery. With the balance of that payment in my pocket, and the invoice³ in Jana's purse we enter Bayan Na⁴.

The store sells most of what you need to build a house here in the Philippines, though we purchase the cement, sand and gravel elsewhere. Bayan Na's prices are too high when it comes to the sanitary and PPR pipe for plumbing but, on steel, wire, fixtures, electrical outlets, and tile, we have found them a good place to do business.

Our real problem with them has to do with staff. You get assigned a sales rep. He or she will respond to your request for a week or two and then nothing. Later you find they have quit and no one knows you from Adam when you call the store's phone. So you have to go back to the store, and find out what's what.

Once again, the sales rep we have been dealing with recently has gone missing, but that is not of any particular significance today. Today we are here to get that which we had reserved, four sales reps ago. After all, the invoice says Bayan Na on it and not the name of a salesman.

Like all stores here, there is an armed uniformed guard at the front door. He is your doorman. I kid you not. He sees you, opens the door for you and if you are having problems backing your vehicle out into traffic when you leave, he will be out there to assist.

So, in we walk, not having to make the effort to push a door open as we enter the air conditioned space of this very attractive store front. Jana fishes the invoice out as a salesman appears. She hands it to him and the first sign of trouble surfaces. He asks, Why are you here? Jana tells him, To pay the balance and pick up the items. We are asked to wait.

We are walking around, looking at tiles for the walls of the various CRs when the salesman approaches. He explains that there is a problem.

He claims, the items are not available, as the salesman we dealt with is no longer here. Jana is dickering with him when I cut in. This has nothing to do with a salesman. This is a Bayan Na invoice. We gave you one hundred thousand pesos. You either give us what we ordered or you give us back our money plus 10% per month interest. I don't give away my money, to your company or anyone else. The guy starts to argue and I send him off, telling him, Go get our items or our money plus interest. Go!

And off he goes. Next someone approaches asking us if we really have the balance to pay. We tell him we have it. He looks pained as he walks away.

We have now been waiting over an hour. Someone else approaches saying we should start over, selecting what we want from what's on the floor now. I shut him down. I am pissed as I tell him, No! I want to see the owner. Now! The owner.

Jana is fit to be tied but upset with me as well. Don't talk loud! Do not embarrass me. Do not be rude!

What have I done? This is wrong. You know it.

No, the man say if we don't get our things in 60 days, maybe they will charge more.

Jana. They are just trying to scare you because they have screwed up!

Don't be rude!

No more than three minutes later a young man approaches. I look at him, having a hard time believing that this guy is the owner but, then I remember that many of these businesses are part of ethnic Chinese family dynasties, with the kids given a business to run. This guy does look Chinese and I do remember that a family owns related businesses to this one in town. He tells me his name is Jonathan. And then he starts to mention the salesman...

I cut him off fast. Do not tell me that. This invoice is from your company, not a salesman. When you made it, at that desk, I am pointing to a long counter with at least five employees staffing it, you made it in triplicate. Now I don't care what you did wrong with your company's paperwork. I gave you more than one hundred thousand pesos. That was not a loan. You had the obligation to reserve our items. Don't talk to me about sales people.

I am sorry, Sir. We make a mistake, we not know to reserve. The salesman not tell us...

Jonathan stop this now. It is not a salesman's fault that your company doesn't do what they are supposed to do when you receive money. The salesman didn't get my money. The people at that desk did, and I am pointing to yet another counter.

Yes, I am sorry that we have this problem but, we can get you what you want. However it is at another location. You can go there and...

No. I want to see and inspect everything before you get another centavo from me. Bring it here. How soon can you bring it here?

Tomorrow morning.

Jana says to me, They open at 9, we will come then.

No, Jana. Jonathan, when will the truck arrive?

At 10AM, Sir.

OK, we will be here at 10:30.

Thank you, Sir.

Good day, Jonathan. We will see you tomorrow.

Sir, may I please make a copy of your invoice?

What happened to the other two copies?

All I get is a smile. I give him the invoice and wait for it to be returned. At least we do not have to pay the five peso photo copy fee that you get charged every time some organization here, needs a copy of their own stuff. The invoice is returned to me. I hand it to Jana, my keeper of all things official.

Sir, may I have your phone number?

Jana looks at him and says, Your sales staff has it!

Yes, Ma'am, but, I want to handle this myself.

OK I am getting a feel for how lost this guy is. Jana is about to give Jonathan grief but, I cut her off. You know, I have given this information out to your staff members at least fifteen times and every time they then quit.

Yes Sir, I have a big problem with that.

You also don't know what type of project we have and what we will need next, because you haven't been told by your sales staff. Is that correct?

Yes, Sir.

Jonathan, you have a nice store but, last week I tried to purchase something you display here, only to be told that you don't have it. I bought it elsewhere. You have piles of paperwork and you have no idea what is in it.

Yes, Sir. We need to improve.

Well, there are many things you can do to improve. You are just lucky that your competition is just as bad off as you are.

I give him all our numbers: my cell, our landline, and Jana's cell. We walk out, respectfully, but clearly a bit frustrated. Those in the store are not frustrated but, they are staring. They are not used to seeing their boss in such a position.

The next morning, we return to Bayan Na. There is a parking place open right at the front door. That is unusual. Normally parking is a matter of finding something to squeeze into on the periphery. As we get to the door, the guard is opening it, staff is clustered close to the door as is a pile of items. Some in boxes and some crated. Also standing there is Jonathan.

We go through the dance of opening each box, noting that it is the correct item, checking it off the list and moving it to our pickup. Jonathan doesn't think all this is necessary. I smile and tell him that it is for his protection as well as mine. At no time, in the future, will either of us have reason to complain about what happened today. I hand him the other one hundred thousand pesos, and sign the receipt.

As all the boxes that we can carry this trip are finally loaded, I turn to this young owner, with real concern in my mind. Sir, you have a good store here but, you have a real mess too. You have no reliable process to tell you what you have sold, where product is, what you owe customers, who your customers are, who your sales staff are talking to, and what you might need to order. You probably have significant problems with damage in your storerooms and I bet you have a real problem with pilfering of things going out the back door.

You are right but, how do you know this?

It's obvious! You have a mountain of paperwork that is of no value to you. You have staff who spend massive amounts of time creating and checking that paperwork, and yet you have no useful information. It does you no good for a sales person to collect information, if that information is not available to you. You are not using any inventory control system that does you much good and nothing is barcoded. There are no RFID tags on your large items.

Sir, what is RFID?

OK, this guy is sweet and completely lost. I talk to him about point of sale (POS), inventory control, just-in-time inventory management, sales force management, centralized data services, integrating his remote locations, competitor analysis to check out the competition, RFID to control pilferage and link-in's with inventory control, as well as a number of other management concepts. I can see his eyeballs rolling to the back of his head. The poor guy is way out of his depth.

He meekly asks me how I know about these things. I was the COO of a mid-sized retail company in the USA. I am not telling you about anything any other such person in my position wouldn't know about. All this is pretty standard.

What's a COO?

Yeh, OK, that is the Chief Operating Officer. I reported to the CEO and the corporate board. Look I am not trying to sell you anything but, if you want help in getting your operations running well, controlling costs and enhancing your growth potential, give me a call. I like your store and I love living here in the Philippines. If your store flourishes, it can only be a good thing for me.

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Chapter 1