Legalize the Illegals?

Government was toying the ideas of legalize firecrackers ban during Chinese New Year.  But no decision was made till now to reverse the ban.
Strange, the loud noise of firecrackers and fireworks never stopped from New Year eve.  And I believe it will be continued till the 15th days of CNY.

Questions to be answered:

1. What's the purpose of a ban, where people don't care about the ban?
2. Any serious enforcement in upholding the ban?
3. If burning of firecrackers is illegal, how about import of fire crackers?  What happen to our custom?
4. If banning could not solve the problem, how about legalize it one and for all?  And government can earn extra import tax.

Inflated Low Cost Carrier

Gong Xi Fa Cai!  Just noticed our world best low cost carrier has inflated its price after Gong Xi Fa Cai.  And it's at an extremely high rate of 20%!!

• Hot seat price has increased from RM25 to RM30
• Pick a seat price has increased from RM5 to RM6
• Luggage (15Kg) has increased from RM30 to RM35
• Plus the unknown inflation

Traveling on the low cost carrier is no longer low cost, taxi fare to LCCT is more expensive, there are more fees charged (e.g. convenient fee which most people have no idea what is it), there are more delays ...

Comparatively, a full fare airlines fare is much more straight forward, and even at a cheaper price nowadays.  I need to seriously re-plan my future travelling, and should look at alternative in my next travel arrangement...

Budget 2010 Credit Card Tax - Malaysian Mudah Lupa?

Still remember that the PM announced in Budget 2010 that the government will be charging RM50 tax on every principal credit card and this amount can not be absorbed by the bank. (Read here)

The following diagram (from thestar.com.my) was the illustration from thestar.com.my on how customers could pay their credit card service tax:

Well, after a year, the "Malaysian Mudah Lupa" (Malaysian easily forget) attitude is surfacing on this issue.

What the banks had said previously already dumped into the thrash can, just for the seek of keeping old customer, and recruiting new customer. To recap what the banks had said:

• "our cardholders have the option to redeem (the service tax) using their points"
• "the credit card industry as a whole has come to a consensus that this tax will be borne by the cardholders and not the banks"
• "customers could also opt to use their reward points to redeem their service tax"

In order to keep customer, or to recruit new customer, some of the new promotion the banks had come out:

• Give away 10,000 free points, so that the card holder can use the free points to offset the RM50 credit card tax (Well, they still keep their promise, they did not absorb the tax, they only reward their customer with free reward points)
• Give cash rebate up front for new card approval (Same, again is reward and not absorb.)
• When you want to cancel your card, the bank can waive the tax with no condition.

Malaysian Mudah Lupa? Enforcement don't care? Time is diluting all policies? Revenue takes priority than compliance, till it's worthwhile to take calculated risk?

Numbers To Be "Proud" Of

From Bernama news, read here:

Souvenir sales at Shanghai’s Malaysian Pavilion reaches RM230,317

September 11, 2010

SHANGHAI, Sept 11 – Sales of souvenirs at the Malaysia Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo 2010 here reached RMB503,000 (RM230,317) over the past four months ...

According to Dr Ng, as of yesterday, the number of visitors to the Malaysia Pavilion had reached 4.715 million...

Not sure whether the reporter reported the wrong figures, or our tourism ministry gave the wrong numbers. This is definitely not something to be proud of, that you want to publish it.

4.715 million visitors, and the souvenirs sales was RM230,317 which translates to souvenir sales of less than 5 cents per visitor; or out of 20 visitors, 1 will spend RM1 on souvenir.

Oh please, use a better headline.

News of Denial

Caught my eyes to see so many news of denial on The Malaysian Insider front page:

1. Hisham denies links between bookies and football betting snub
2. Ulama denies joining Umno for protection
3. Finance Ministry denies compensating Vincent Tan
4. Selangor rep denies quitting PKR

There are too many accusers? Or there are too may lies?

The Worst Web Site - Unilever.com

Sometimes it's still acceptable to see some broken links in the web site. But a response like the above after you fill up the "Contact Us" page is totally UNACCEPTABLE.

It's same for unilever.com, and unilever.com.my. Does it mean "Don't contact us, we don't want to listen?"

Go Green? Walk The Talk Please!

Went to 1 Utama Shopping Complex last weekend, wanted to enjoy their White Christmas theme.

Recalled YB Elizabeth Wong was at 1Utama early this month, launching their "White Lyrical Christmas" theme. Also, there are a lot of publicity on 1Utama "Go Green Without Wrapping" and free recycle bags campaigns. Found the article at The Sun, read here.

When a corporate is embracing environment protection green campaign, we should laud their effort. But if a green campaign is run on the expense of the environment, we should all condemn this so called "talk green" publicity.

Look at the following photo, this is the white Christmas decoration at 1Utama:

I enjoyed it too. It really gave me a white Christmas feeling. But look around the stage? What are those tall white decoration?

I took the following picture at the back of the stage:

You are absolutely right! These are TREEs! These are well growing TREEs being cut down, striped off the leaves, and painted in white for this white Christmas decoration.

Walked around 1Utama, you will find hundred of these poor white trees serving as white Christmas decoration. My heart was fast sinking. I just hoped that 1Utama will clarify that these trees are not trees, they are just white dummy,.... I really hope ....

A white Christmas theme, a Go Green campaign, launched by a Green portfolio state exco, on the expense of hundred of innocent well growing trees.

This should be a good lesson learned by all the corporate, don't just talk green, walk green first before you talk green! Millions pair of eyes are guarding on these green opportunists. If you don't walk green, you will get a black publicity for your talk green campaign.