Property Maintenance Hassles

[fototek1]

Warning, THIS IS A RANT ABOUT MY FRUSTRATION.

I am getting so annoyed at the poor quality of work done here and the TF (Talent Fee or Wage). I designed and built our home in the US and spent the extra time and money to do things the right way to help with future maintenance. Its been 20 years since I finished building and all is good.

My wife and I are currently here in the Philippines for 3 weeks and she decided it would be good for me to spend a week doing maintenance at her/our Motel so I get a taste of retirement. It was probably a bad idea on her part as now I want nothing to do with this place. The motel is new construction and a nice place but some things need fixing. I do not have my own tools and trying to work with what I have here is making things worse. I am sometimes labeled as a perfectionist. The materials I have access to at the hardware stores are limited, quality is poor and prices are expensive. It has taken me a week to do what would have taken me a day in the US and I am not happy with the quality of the work I have done due to the limited supplies and tools.

So now on to the TF rant. Our staff called in an electrician because the light on our sign was out. The lazy bastard showed up spent some time out there and cut off the connector on the light and said  "this is your problem you need one of these" P600. He didn't fix the problem he just said this is your problem. So this is a task on my wife's list.  Long story short, the connector wasn't bad, it was the connection feeding the connector but now I needed to buy a new connector because he cut the old one. It's fixed but WTF. I am an Electrical engineer and the way they do electrical work here makes me cringe. Half of our hotel is done well and half not so much. The fire Marshall came yesterday and said we need to install a fire alarm system with pull handles and bells. Long story shortened, we had to get the wired in version because we need heat/smoke detectors. Now I am trying to figure out how to get the wires run so it looks ok. The building is finished and looks really good. I am worried someone is going to do hack work when I am not here and I have decided I am not doing the work because it is to frustrating for me......first TF price is P30,000 estimate for 14 rooms and "maybe" more.....Its only a 2 story building and made of brick, its not going to burn! waste of money. 

Thanks for listening  I will stop complaining for a few minutes and go drink a beer.

  

[hk blues]

15 minutes ago, fototek1 said:

Warning, THIS IS A RANT ABOUT MY FRUSTRATION.

I am getting so annoyed at the poor quality of work done here and the TF (Talent Fee or Wage). I designed and built our home in the US and spent the extra time and money to do things the right way to help with future maintenance. Its been 20 years since I finished building and all is good.

My wife and I are currently here in the Philippines for 3 weeks and she decided it would be good for me to spend a week doing maintenance at her/our Motel so I get a taste of retirement. It was probably a bad idea on her part as now I want nothing to do with this place. The motel is new construction and a nice place but some things need fixing. I do not have my own tools and trying to work with what I have here is making things worse. I am sometimes labeled as a perfectionist. The materials I have access to at the hardware stores are limited, quality is poor and prices are expensive. It has taken me a week to do what would have taken me a day in the US and I am not happy with the quality of the work I have done due to the limited supplies and tools.

So now on to the TF rant. Our staff called in an electrician because the light on our sign was out. The lazy bastard showed up spent some time out there and cut off the connector on the light and said  "this is your problem you need one of these" P600. He didn't fix the problem he just said this is your problem. So this is a task on my wife's list.  Long story short, the connector wasn't bad, it was the connection feeding the connector but now I needed to buy a new connector because he cut the old one. It's fixed but WTF. I am an Electrical engineer and the way they do electrical work here makes me cringe. Half of our hotel is done well and half not so much. The fire Marshall came yesterday and said we need to install a fire alarm system with pull handles and bells. Long story shortened, we had to get the wired in version because we need heat/smoke detectors. Now I am trying to figure out how to get the wires run so it looks ok. The building is finished and looks really good. I am worried someone is going to do hack work when I am not here and I have decided I am not doing the work because it is to frustrating for me......first TF price is P30,000 estimate for 14 rooms and "maybe" more.....Its only a 2 story building and made of brick, its not going to burn! waste of money. 

Thanks for listening  I will stop complaining for a few minutes and go drink a beer.

  

I think we've all been there!  Several times.  Beer does help.

[bastonjock]

2 hours ago, fototek1 said:

Warning, THIS IS A RANT ABOUT MY FRUSTRATION.

I am getting so annoyed at the poor quality of work done here and the TF (Talent Fee or Wage). I designed and built our home in the US and spent the extra time and money to do things the right way to help with future maintenance. Its been 20 years since I finished building and all is good.

My wife and I are currently here in the Philippines for 3 weeks and she decided it would be good for me to spend a week doing maintenance at her/our Motel so I get a taste of retirement. It was probably a bad idea on her part as now I want nothing to do with this place. The motel is new construction and a nice place but some things need fixing. I do not have my own tools and trying to work with what I have here is making things worse. I am sometimes labeled as a perfectionist. The materials I have access to at the hardware stores are limited, quality is poor and prices are expensive. It has taken me a week to do what would have taken me a day in the US and I am not happy with the quality of the work I have done due to the limited supplies and tools.

So now on to the TF rant. Our staff called in an electrician because the light on our sign was out. The lazy bastard showed up spent some time out there and cut off the connector on the light and said  "this is your problem you need one of these" P600. He didn't fix the problem he just said this is your problem. So this is a task on my wife's list.  Long story short, the connector wasn't bad, it was the connection feeding the connector but now I needed to buy a new connector because he cut the old one. It's fixed but WTF. I am an Electrical engineer and the way they do electrical work here makes me cringe. Half of our hotel is done well and half not so much. The fire Marshall came yesterday and said we need to install a fire alarm system with pull handles and bells. Long story shortened, we had to get the wired in version because we need heat/smoke detectors. Now I am trying to figure out how to get the wires run so it looks ok. The building is finished and looks really good. I am worried someone is going to do hack work when I am not here and I have decided I am not doing the work because it is to frustrating for me......first TF price is P30,000 estimate for 14 rooms and "maybe" more.....Its only a 2 story building and made of brick, its not going to burn! waste of money. 

Thanks for listening  I will stop complaining for a few minutes and go drink a beer.

  

With you all the way on this , I am also an electrician, one of the local sparkies asked me how to go about getting a work Visa as an electrician 

I laughed internally , I said our systems are totally different ,there are 6 types of earthling arrangements, can you name two ?

What's earthling he replied?

I've had work done on my condo by a so called Aproved painter , I'll attach a couple of pics , he painted around the vase and left the patch under it unpainted and check out the grouting in the cr 

[Arizona Kid]

3 hours ago, fototek1 said:

Warning, THIS IS A RANT ABOUT MY FRUSTRATION.

I am getting so annoyed at the poor quality of work done here and the TF (Talent Fee or Wage). I designed and built our home in the US and spent the extra time and money to do things the right way to help with future maintenance. Its been 20 years since I finished building and all is good.

My wife and I are currently here in the Philippines for 3 weeks and she decided it would be good for me to spend a week doing maintenance at her/our Motel so I get a taste of retirement. It was probably a bad idea on her part as now I want nothing to do with this place. The motel is new construction and a nice place but some things need fixing. I do not have my own tools and trying to work with what I have here is making things worse. I am sometimes labeled as a perfectionist. The materials I have access to at the hardware stores are limited, quality is poor and prices are expensive. It has taken me a week to do what would have taken me a day in the US and I am not happy with the quality of the work I have done due to the limited supplies and tools.

So now on to the TF rant. Our staff called in an electrician because the light on our sign was out. The lazy bastard showed up spent some time out there and cut off the connector on the light and said  "this is your problem you need one of these" P600. He didn't fix the problem he just said this is your problem. So this is a task on my wife's list.  Long story short, the connector wasn't bad, it was the connection feeding the connector but now I needed to buy a new connector because he cut the old one. It's fixed but WTF. I am an Electrical engineer and the way they do electrical work here makes me cringe. Half of our hotel is done well and half not so much. The fire Marshall came yesterday and said we need to install a fire alarm system with pull handles and bells. Long story shortened, we had to get the wired in version because we need heat/smoke detectors. Now I am trying to figure out how to get the wires run so it looks ok. The building is finished and looks really good. I am worried someone is going to do hack work when I am not here and I have decided I am not doing the work because it is to frustrating for me......first TF price is P30,000 estimate for 14 rooms and "maybe" more.....Its only a 2 story building and made of brick, its not going to burn! waste of money. 

Thanks for listening  I will stop complaining for a few minutes and go drink a beer.

  

"It's more fun in the Philippines" I feel your pain but your problems are far from over unless you have connections, and can pay for them. Soon the mayors will start looking for their cut. A beer won't help. Better start drinking the hard stuff!

[fototek1]

I think we have the political situation all set. My Father in-law owns a motels and many other businesses in the area and is good friends with the Mayor. Not the best picture but this is the motel. We will be finishing the area above the office next year for our own use. Right now we are staying in one of the rooms.

[Freebie]

Quality is not a word I would associate with building works here. Generally the approach is shoddy and from my experience most tradesmen get away with whatever they can , if and when they can.

No one seems to inspect their own work with an eye for keeping their work area tidy, neat or to the standard that was agreed. Most seem to want to skip skive and take short cuts.  Its been like this for the past 30 years that Ive known the country.

Sometimes I can accept and laugh about it and other times its frustrating as I know it can be done so much better.r Ive worked with many Filipinos in other countries and there, they follow the rules, the standards and can do good work when properly supervised. But here......watch every worker and repeat the instructions and never take a break because something might not be done as expected

 

[Jollygoodfellow]

5 hours ago, fototek1 said:

Its only a 2 story building and made of brick, its not going to burn! waste of money. 

Smoke from burning furniture can kill.

I dont know why it was not in the original plans. Depends on where your is hotel but the hardware stores in the city such as Cebu have good stock.