Why Jose Velarde and Jose Pidal are VIP Depositors

Why Jose Velarde and Jose Pidal are VIP Depositors


If you’re Juan de la Cruz, struggling with a measly pay but still parsimonious that you have saved enough to tide you over the next retrenchment or until you bag another contractual job, better think twice about approaching Philippine banks for help in keeping your money.

You see, you’ll be asked to produce two or more valid IDs. Two or three IDs and that’s it. Piece of cake, you might say. Well, try giving them your school ID with your chubby, stress-free face plastered on it, and they’ll turn it down. Worse, they might call security because they don’t appreciate jokers. Company IDs are not honored everywhere unless you’re opening a payroll account. Besides, some companies do not religiously issue IDs and some Recto “duplicating experts” can produce them. PhilHealth IDs are not good either, leaving you with the driver’s license, passport, SSS, Pag-Ibig, etc. After you’ve presented valid IDs, they’ll run a cross check, just to make sure you’re no low life opening an account with a fistful of pesos – money that will balloon into a million in a week’s time. After suffering under the very discriminating eyes of bank employees, you might console yourself with the thought that other wannabe depositors had it worse than you. Think again.

Remember Jose? No, not the hero immortalized in the coin, but Jose Velarde and Jose Pidal. You see these two dudes had issues with their bank accounts, issues big enough to be printed by broadsheets and tabloids and be broadcasted by Korina, Mike, Mel, and Ted in their patented vocal cord busting fashion (if only Michael Buffer knew that he had worthy competitors here). You might wonder. These men are public figures. How in the name of heaven did they slip through the very discriminating eyes of bank employees? You fall silent for a moment before a joke starts playing in your mind, but the punch line is not from Bitoy and the clowns from Bubble Gang. The joke is this: Bankers welcome honest, small-time depositors, but moneyed crooks are VIPs because they’ll only have to tell the financial whiz kids their preferred aliases, but Jose would be fine.


Prospero E. Pulma Jr.