Cebu Survey

[Lordblacknail]

I have been reading posts on this forum for six months now and I have concluded that it is very difficult to get real information here. I am not saying that there should be real information, I understand how hard it is to get when everyone has an opinion. We are moving to Cebu permanently in less than two weeks, and there are a lot of things that I wish I knew when I get there, and I don't know them.So, I would like to start a survey. I will start it off with asking what is the best of the things that I can think of that I want to know right now, and please feel free to add your own topics for review. What I would like to see is a vote on items and services. I will then correlate the raw data, and list them as Best, Good, and Fair or whatever. Everybody has an opinion, so lets get them out there and see if we can get a concenus.What is the best tasting distilled water in small bottles?What is the best tasting spring water in small bottles?What is the best tasting delivered water as above? What is the best internet service?What is the best cell phone service?What is the best bank?These are things that I am going to want to know when I get on the plane on the 17th, and I don't have a clue about any of them. If 12 people vote on the best tasting spring water, and ten of them say Joe's Water, then that doesn't make Joe's Water the best, but it sure is a place to start. I can live with that.So share your opinions guys please. And admin, if this is out of line asking for actual names of vendors, sorry and delete this please.Thanks for your input and lets get some votes.

[Jollygoodfellow]

I have been reading posts on this forum for six months now and I have concluded that it is very difficult to get real information here. I am not saying that there should be real information, I understand how hard it is to get when everyone has an opinion. We are moving to Cebu permanently in less than two weeks, and there are a lot of things that I wish I knew when I get there, and I don't know them.So, I would like to start a survey. I will start it off with asking what is the best of the things that I can think of that I want to know right now, and please feel free to add your own topics for review. What I would like to see is a vote on items and services. I will then correlate the raw data, and list them as Best, Good, and Fair or whatever. Everybody has an opinion, so lets get them out there and see if we can get a concenus.What is the best tasting distilled water in small bottles?What is the best tasting spring water in small bottles?What is the best tasting delivered water as above? What is the best internet service?What is the best cell phone service?What is the best bank?These are things that I am going to want to know when I get on the plane on the 17th, and I don't have a clue about any of them. If 12 people vote on the best tasting spring water, and ten of them say Joe's Water, then that doesn't make Joe's Water the best, but it sure is a place to start. I can live with that.So share your opinions guys please. And admin, if this is out of line asking for actual names of vendors, sorry and delete this please.Thanks for your input and lets get some votes.

I'm not sure why you say you cant get real information here,have you asked the question before? Any information on a forum will be someones opinion or facts to them but not necessary the correct ones for someone else.In a way its how people ask questions as to what information they will receive,for example this post says Cebu.Cebu what, city? province? Island?Your questions are genuine and I'm sure any answers you get will be too,taste is a hard question as what taste good to one may not to another but again it is real information from the person who gives it.The rest of the questions will get different answers because of the variables,cell phone service provider may work great in the city but someone in the province may get a better deal from another.

[Dave Hounddriver]

Sounds like fun. I'll gladly give my opinion:What is the best tasting distilled water in small bottles?What is the best tasting spring water in small bottles?What is the best tasting delivered water as above?They all taste the same to me. For the delivered water, there are 2 or more water distributors on every street so you just have to try one to see which you like.What is the best internet service?I think they all suck for speed and reliability but SmarBro is convenient when it works. (A USB modem)What is the best cell phone service?Smart, because most of the people I know have that and its cheaper to text Smart to Smart than Globe to Smart.What is the best bank?Pro's and Con's to each one. I like to stick with a major bank as opposed to a rural bank but there are a half a dozen or more good ones.

[Art2ro]

Lordblacknail,The first paragraph of your post, I find it an unfair remark, because this forum has always'd answered people's questions fairly and honestly let alone accurate! You probably just haven't asked the appropriate questions in advance to satisfy your query! Also, there is such a thing called Google search you know! So, how can you get any honest cooperation from this forum or any other forum with comments like that (below)? So as to your opinion, if you didn't get any real information here after 6 months of reading, what makes you so sure that anyone here will give you any honest answers after that remark? I have been reading posts on this forum for six months now and I have concluded that it is very difficult to get real information here. I am not saying that there should be real information, I understand how hard it is to get when everyone has an opinion. We are moving to Cebu permanently in less than two weeks, and there are a lot of things that I wish I knew when I get there, and I don't know them.

[Mr Lee]

I also think your post was unfair to all the member here who try their best to answer other members questions, maybe you are thinking about a different forum or your wrote that in the wrong context. Ask questions and you will get answers if members know the answer, and if they don't, then they will usually refrain from giving false info, unlike I have seen on some forums where people who do not even live in the Philippines will tell others what is wrong with the country and that everyone else, in their opinion is stupid.Now to go on to your questions,What is the best tasting distilled water in small bottles?I do not use distilled water.What is the best tasting spring water in small bottles?We happen to like Natures Spring when we buy water in the supermarket but we rarely have to do that except if we run short between deliveries. What is the best tasting delivered water as above? Each of us has our own opinion and I will tell you what works for us and I have posted this before in other parts of this forum. We use "Hey Culligan Man" and have for over 3 years and I am very happy with them. 346 7248 is their number or cell 0928 424 1604 What is the best internet service?None of them works great IMHO but I have been happy with PLDT for the most part once I got them to give me what I pay for, that will usually take a number of phone calls and a visit to the manager in the office. I have also used Smart USB device and have been happy with that. So as for which to use, it is going to depend on what is available in the area you move because you will most often not have a choice since certain areas have only one type of service in them, but you can get the smart bro antenna type anywhere there is good signal or the USB thumb drive version, again only where you have full pin on your cell phone of that provider. There is Smart, Globe and Sun USB devices.What is the best cell phone service?Smart covers more areas if you are going to be out in the provinces a lot. More people here use Smart but I would recommend that you see what people are using in the area that you end up moving to. What is the best bank?We have found BPI to be one of the best banks here but again it will depend on the relationship you develop with the particular branch since I have dealt with quite a few and many seem to be lacking in customer service. If you wish to meet the manager of the bank we do business with and open an account then I would be happy to help you but you may wish to do business closer to where you plan to live. Hope some of that helps.

[No name]

Bank depends on where you are and how you get your money. If in Cebu City, it doesn't matter much.I use BDO because in Bogo City they are the only one here that I can use Xoom to send my money direct into the account.They have higher opening balance requirement and higher minimum balance than mosts. But it isn't a lot. I think P5000 to open and I THINK if it falls below daily AVERAGE balance of P3000 there is I THINK a P300. I don't know the exact number because well, it just isn't that big of a deal. If I need the cash, I take it out. I knew a guy with your nick name a long time ago. Ten years or so, was a webmaster, talked on ICQ back when ICQ was the big program. Any chance that's you?Best water from Grocery store is Wilkins but is also the most expensive.If you get water delivered, who does it will depend on where you live. I don't like my choices in Bogo and I'm sorry but I don't remember the name of the company I got it from in Cebu City. That was three years ago but I'm sure the one Lee gave you will be fine.I have Globe Internet, its actually pretty good MOST of the time. I have a 2Mbps connection and is as expensive as dsl back at home, except I didn't have to buy the modem. Last week the modem died, only took them a day to come out and I live in a jungle. :th_thholysheep: They are usually out the next day. Once it was down for a couple of weeks, really hacked me off too. My GF started calling them every four hours because they kept closing the ticket. We never did get our credit for the time it was down. Why? Because they kept closing the ticket. JERKS. But, it works well when it is up. I think it is my only choice in Bogo. Avoid sat and wireless, use them only as a backup.That reminds me, we once went through the process of getting a second DSL from Smart, it was approved and they never showed up to install despite that we followed up.Yep, forums are full of opinion, you can't expect everyone to agree.

[Lordblacknail]

Well guys, the reason I said I haven't gotten any real information is because it is true. I still don't know what water to buy, what internet service to get, or what cell phone provider to get. But I really hope to when everybody votes for their favorite. You guys know that I did not mean any disrespect to the forum owner or any of its members. It is hard to glean useable information from many many posts. Hence the survey. Everybody on the forums tries to answer members questions the best they can, but that information is scattered all over the forum. When this is done, everything that we can think of that a first timer to live here will need, will hopefully be right there in the results. Again, it doesn't mean we will know what the best is, just give us a place to start from. Thank you Mr. Lee for complaining about my wording but answering the survey anyway. I appreciate it. How about you Bossman and Art2ro? Can you forgive my wording and help with the survey? I am sure Bossman has a wealth of info to share, don't know Art2ro, but I am sure he does too.I have been to the RP many times, and one thing sticks out in my mind about things that I learned. The first time I went to CDO, my gf said, buy the blue capped bottles of water, not the green ones. (or vice versa, can't remember), and she was absolutely right. One was decent the other one tasted bad. That is what I call real information.

[Mr Lee]

Well guys, the reason I said I haven't gotten any real information is because it is true. I still don't know what water to buy, what internet service to get, or what cell phone provider to get. But I really hope to when everybody votes for their favorite. You guys know that I did not mean any disrespect to the forum owner or any of its members. It is hard to glean useable information from many many posts. Hence the survey. Everybody on the forums tries to answer members questions the best they can, but that information is scattered all over the forum. When this is done, everything that we can think of that a first timer to live here will need, will hopefully be right there in the results. Again, it doesn't mean we will know what the best is, just give us a place to start from. Thank you Mr. Lee for complaining about my wording but answering the survey anyway. I appreciate it. How about you Bossman and Art2ro? Can you forgive my wording and help with the survey? I am sure Bossman has a wealth of info to share, don't know Art2ro, but I am sure he does too.I have been to the RP many times, and one thing sticks out in my mind about things that I learned. The first time I went to CDO, my gf said, buy the blue capped bottles of water, not the green ones. (or vice versa, can't remember), and she was absolutely right. One was decent the other one tasted bad. That is what I call real information.

As for your comment of judging water, there are many types with blue caps and each area may sell different brands and not all brands may be available in all areas, and that goes for most things in the Philippines, since I find things here in a constant state of flux at times. Also I happen to like the brand that comes with green caps, so different strokes for different folks and you will no doubt have to try some items yourself to see what your taste buds tell you about them. Now what do I mean by flux, when shopping I will often find an item that I really like such as a brand of Mayonnaise, coffee, water etc, only to find on my return trip the following week that they no longer have that item in stock, and may not get it back in for weeks or sometimes months, and in one case I never found it again, so all I can say is that this is the Philippines and nothing like back home, and living here is very different than vacations here, take it from someone who had spent many vacations here in the last 17 years before finally living here about 4 months every year in the last number of years and things continue to change all the time and just when I get used to something, along comes another change. Another thing is going to be what fast access is available to you where you will live, example, in our building you can only have PLDT because the building made a deal with them, so while I can use anyones USB device and do at times, I cannot have Globe dsl even if I wanted it and Sky Cable fast access was not available to me last year, and I have been told by residents that it is still not available this year in our building, but I will go directly to the cable company and check for myself in the next few weeks. So in closing, all your surveying may end up for naught since the best of anything may not be available to you where you decide to settle in, and therefore you may end up settling for what is available, but please feel free to ask direct questions and I and others will do our best to give our opinions on the items in them. Hope that helps

[Art2ro]

When we first arrived in the Philippines in 1998 and first lived in the province of Castillejos, Zambales in Northern Central Luzon, it was all trail and error in our daily life! We didn't have a vehicle, our own home, DSL or a home telephone until years later! 12 yrs later, we are finally settled in indefinitely! So, good luck with anyone's move to the Philippines! It's all about "boots on the ground"! "Different strokes for different folks" as I always say!