Issues with elderly relative in the Philippines – advice needed

[budakhan]

Hi, I have a bit of a complicated situation regarding an elderly relative in the Philippines and I was wondering if anyone on here would be able to give some advice as I know very little about the how things work over there.

 

A few weeks back my family received an email from my relative’s Filipino wife/girlfriend (who he has a kid with) saying his mental health was deteriorating and she needed help with the situation. She also revealed that his tourist visa has expired, not sure when but it was ok in feb as he re-entered the Philippines.

 

It’s a complicated situation as he has never really kept in contact with anyone from my family; I’ve only met him three times, so no one has a phone number/email/address for him only his wife/girlfriends email address.

 

We want to sort the situation out, get his visa official, get his health assessed, and arrange any care he needs if necessary over there so he can be near his kid.

 

I’m considering calling the British embassy/consulate for assistance, however given the visa situation I’m a bit sceptical as to what they would obliged to tell the Philippines government.

 

If I was to contact them for assistance would they be able to assist in the sorting the visa situation out? Or would they be obliged to get him out the country ASAP?

 

If anyone can offer any advice regarding this it would be much appreciated as I want to get things moving and get him the help he needs.

 

Thanks

[scott h]

1 hour ago, budakhan said:

complicated situation

It sure is. First of all welcome to our forum and I hope we can be of some assistance, remember that none of us are experts in any immigration or legal matters, just a lot of practical experience from living here. 

Forgive me for being blunt in my Yankee manner but here it goes 

1 hour ago, budakhan said:

she needed help

I recommend that until you become 100% sure of situation, DO not send any money. Scams of every sort are rampant here. Especially since you have said that your relative has not kept you informed of his situation in the past. Gather as much information as you can.

1 hour ago, budakhan said:

I’m considering calling the British embassy/consulate for assistance,

Personally I think this is the best approach,  bearing in mind that if he is found to be incompetent or is deported because of visa violation, do you have a plan to deal with your relative once he returns to his home country? If the UK is like the USA if they find him and recommend that he return home, they will ask you for the air fair. This is standard practice in the USA embassy and I am willing to be the UK is not much different. In the case of the US, the embassy will only provide for return air fare as a last result once they are satisfied that the family can not help pay. 

We have a lot of Brit members and I am sure they will add to this shortly. I hope this has helped a little

[Dr. Shiva]

If possible try to visit him to check the authenticity of the case. First get his visa issue fixed as fast as possible. Even if that is costly. Overstaying is not a joke. In the worst case he can land in Bicutan. (I dunno if the british embassy would help in this case also.) Then try to get help from the british embassy to get more assistance. If there is a health insurance try to find out if they have an assistance to get him back to Great Britain. I agree with Scott to not send any money without checking the case personally. 

Edited November 9, 2017 by Dr. Shiva

[Kuya John]

2 hours ago, budakhan said:

A few weeks back my family received an email from my relative’s Filipino wife/girlfriend (who he has a kid with) saying his mental health was deteriorating

I presume that is the only E-mail received ?

In which case I would be a little suspicious.......repeat advice check it out before sending any money.

[MikeB]

Tell the wife/gf to get him to a phone. You need to speak with him yourself and assess the situation before doing anything.

[budakhan]

Thanks for the replies everyone, i left a couple of details out my original post to try and simplify explaining the situation.

There's no chance of me/anyone sending any money to his wife/gf, i've lived in Asia (China not philippines) before so I'm aware of the wife/gf scams. I strongly suspect she is ripping him off as she's replied to another email since complaining about struggling with money, without directly asking for money she was obviously looking for sympathy. As I said she isn't getting anything till i've assessed the situation in person.

we have a rough location where they live from the co-ordinates of a photo she emailed, however so far she's not provided an address despite us asking. She says my relative doesn't want us to know as he doesn't want us involved, this could well be the case after talking to other relatives who know his character.

He's definitely sick as we've managed to track down one of his old friends in the UK this week who told us he randomly turned up at his house a year ago and was showing signs of dementia. So i don't think that bits a scam.

We're trying to get in contact with him directly but its likely he will only talk to his old friend and we're expecting a lot of resistance from when it comes to dealing with whatever illness/care he has.

At some point i'm gonna have to go over there and deal with this in person but up to now I've just been piecing info together and planning scenarios. I figured the embassy would be a good first step before i go over.

Initial thoughts are to get him the care he needs over there as his money will go further and he's not lived in the UK since 60's/70's (he's not been in the Philippines more than a year though).

Does anyone know if i was to call the embassy what the scenario would be?

1. would they be able to find him (if I can't find his address out)? would they use local police to do this exposing his visa situation in the process?

2. would they be able to assist him to sort his visa situation out so he can remain in the Philippines (f i can give them an address)?

3. if i make contact with them are they legally bound to report the situation to the Philippines government?

Again thanks for the replies, this entire thing has been a mess from the start.

[Dave Hounddriver]

1 hour ago, budakhan said:

Does anyone know if i was to call the embassy what the scenario would be?

In a couple of instances where family members have tried to find me, by calling the Canadian Embassy, the Embassy was good enough to send me an email and ask me to contact them.  That's all.  If you think he would reply to the Embassy then try it.  If you think he will be disappointed with you for putting him on their radar then perhaps don't try it.

If I were the one you were looking for, I would rather you contact my Facebook friends who live near me and ask them.  Chances are good you would find at least one friend on his Facebook page that would know.  Almost all the expats I know here are on Facebook but some are more active there than others.

[budakhan]

Thanks for the reply Dave.

unfortunately he doesn't have any online presence at all, I've searched everything and it's like he's a ghost. From what I understand he's never even had a mobile phone.

anyway good to understand what will happen by contacting the embassy. 

Done some searching on what the British embassy will/won't do and it seems like there's 2 options :

1. Contact the embassy to find him then I get him a flight to get him back to the uk after paying the visa fines. Then access the situation.

2. Go to the Philippines, sort his visa out myself and access the situation

 

[Dave Hounddriver]

2 minutes ago, budakhan said:

it seems like there's 2 options :

There may be a third option.  If you don't want to go to the Philippines yourself and sort this out but you are willing to go to that much expense, then hire a local expat who has some investigative abilities and knows how to find people and assess the situation.  Do you at least know what island he is on?

[Jack Peterson]

2 minutes ago, Dave Hounddriver said:

Do you at least know what island he is on?

@budakhan

If he is on Negoros, let us know, we have 2 (Two) Pretty good UK Embassy Wardens in Dumaguete that may be able to help you