This post is about my pain in the ass!, my fedex experience as courier for the item that was sent to me from USA to the Philippines. I also hope that this post would serve as guide on how to avoid Fedex as your courier & how to handle the situation if it happens the same thing to you.

It was Dec. 21, 2009 when my item arrived early in the morning at NAIA Terminal. Then it was transferred right away to Cargohaus, inc. located at the lower ground of Bureau of Customs. I can track my item because of the tracking number that was provided to me by my sender. You can start tracking your item by going to http://www.fedex.com/ph/. If this is your first time to use fedex service you will think having a tracking number would make you feel relax & comfortable. On that day before the office hours ends, I make sure to call the fedex hotline 8558484. I talked to the CSR and she says to me that my item transaction was handled by Fedex agent Mr. Anthony Villanueva of Import department, and this guy will call me to further details and assistance. After that call I decided to just wait after 2 days.

By Dec. 23, 2009 there still no one calling on behalf of fedex, so I decided to call again the hotline. Then the CSR redirect me to import department direct line 8558450. After 2 hours of hanging on the phone & listening to different advertisement of fedex, someone pick-up the phone from that department. I asked for the person handled my transaction and the operator says he is out for lunch, take note during that time its already 2PM in the afternoon and how come he still out for lunch. After that call I tried to track the item on fedex website for the second time. I saw there the item went to Manila on Dec. 22 and went back to Cargohaus inc., Paranaque by Dec 23, 2009. During that time I’m afraid of what is going on to the item specially the succeeding days are 24th & 25th of December which is holiday.

Starting from 26th until 27th I always called the hotline of fedex but I always get the same answer that the item is still under the inspection of Bureau of Customs. I also checked fedex website to track my item and it always say that transaction is still delayed for no reason at all. During that time I’m upset what is going on because I still don’t get any call from fedex agent Mr. Anthony Villanueva. I now called one of my friend from Bureau of Customs to check and monitor if Fedex already submitted any document to process my item. Unfortunately my friend said the item is never been processed by fedex since its arrival Dec. 21st. I asked helped to my friend to do something to call the attention of Fedex and submit the papers to them. Where in fact its the job of fedex to submit it to customs.

By the 28th I called the fedex hotline and monitor the tracking number if there is update, I still get the same feedback. By 7pm I received from my friend a text message that fedex already filed the papers on that day and they already release the papers. My friend advice me to contact my fedex agent the next day to follow up to them and also to avoid the upcoming delay because of another holiday.

Since hotline of fedex, direct line & website tracking is a waste of time. The next day by the 29th I have decided to go to the cargogaus bldg., naia complex, brgy. vitalez, paranaque city. I personally went to Fedex office at the 2nd floor. At the lobby of import department I saw 3 persons already upset because of waiting to the personnel to went out. Behind the cabinet you will see 2 personnel busy where in if you carefully see what their doing, you will see their “friendster account”. At that moment I called their attention and say “EXCUSE ME! can you connect me to your friend Mr. Anthony Villanueva”, so they hurry up to assist me and they replied back that they don’t know that person. They also check the status of my tracking number on fedex Jurassic system and there you go still the same result!. They say transaction is still delayed and they put the blame to Bureau of Customs that its not yet being process. They suggest me to go to CSR office at the 3rd floor of the bldg.

When I was on the 3rd floor, I tried to looked for the name Mr. Anthony Villanueva and the girl replied back he is still out for lunch, this is the funniest & craziest part it was 2PM already at that time again the same reason when I called the last time. Its also confusing because on the hotline they say this agent belong to the import department. I tried to enter on that department. Basically, I notice that this area is like a call center setup so I concluded that when I’m calling 8558484 this department is the one answering my calls. I also discovered that their all busy with their facebook, yahoo messenger, friendster & etc. They didn’t even notice that I was already inside. So I directly talk to their team leader to ask where the heck is Mr. Anthony!. It seems based on his reaction that this guy is just a ghost and not for real.

I can say the analogy if I compare the situation to a game I’m now on the 2nd to the last stage. Immediately 3 person assist me right away before I start to get mad. The team leader check from the other fedex system the status of my item. There you go, it says that by 28th 6pm its already cleared, just like what my friend said to me. Then the process went smoothly after that and I completed my transaction & bring home my item successfully.

Conclusion:
1. Never believe to fedex hotline, they create story telling & ghost employee.
2. Never use fedex because their system is Jurrasic. Meaning to say never rely to their tracking number because its not connected to the updated system.
I also discovered that updating their website is delayed by 15hrs.
3. Never attempt to use their service I discovered that their not secure. When I get my item they didn’t even get any identification from me and it seems they just rely to the tracking number that you will provide to them. Just think about this if someone knows your tracking number and they stole your item/package & don’t expect to fin it anymore.
4. Never trust their computation they give you hidden charges. Based on the receipt it seems I paid twice for docs/stamps.
5. Don’t waste your time waiting, do something!.

Information:
Cargohaus, inc, formerly U-warehouse, inc
- this is where they stored your item or your package

address:
Cargogaus bldg., naia complex, brgy. vitalez, paranaque city
tel: 879-4301/ 4372

http://www.cargohaus.com

Fedex 2nd floor & 3rd floor, Cargogaus bldg., naia complex, brgy. vitalez, paranaque city

http://www.fedex.com/ph/

Fedex hotline: 8558484 Import Department: 8558450

Resources:

http://www.sulit.com.ph/index.php/view+topic/id/18855/Bad+Experience+with+FEDEX

http://www.complaintsboard.com/bycompany/fedex-a438/page/5

I still remember when I was a kid, I always say to myself that “by my 25th birthday I will be financially independent”. And yes its a dream come true for me that now I’m one of the young high-tech entrepreneur in the Philippines.

Wishing more birthday to come for myself and thanks to you my Lord God almighty for all the blessings that you’ve given to me.

Yoshinoya is a famous restaurant originated in Japan. Team Mega is one of their branch located in SM Megamall, Philippines. I won by dropping my calling card to their fish bowl near to their cashier section.

Next time if you plan to visit Yoshinoya just bring your calling card and lots of surprises awaits.

Thank you for the free meal “Yoshinoya Team Mega” until my next visit.

Recently, I attempted to plug-in my smartbro usb MF627 and try to make it work on Ubuntu 9.04. This is my 2nd attempt, the last time I tried it I encountered the same problem. Before I upgraded to 9.04, the recent 8.10 works ok for my smartbro usb MF627.

I’m one of those concern citizen trying to push this device to support our beloved GNU/Linux. I will keep trying 9.04 and also future releases and see if this device will work soon.

Here is what I encountered, during the start-up or boot-up stage. The terminal freeze on reading from usb-serial device. You will see usbserial/usbcore many times and it seems forever loop.

To solve this problem, don’t wait forever, try hitting ESC many times or ctrl+alt+delete to deactivate reading other hardware devices. Try hitting Enter+ESC many times until you reach the login message, asking you to login with your username or password. During this stage you will still encounter annoying reading of usb-serial device. Just continue to sudo root and then try aptitude update.

Make sure to plug your ethernet cable.

Check your ubuntu release:
lsb_release -a

Reconfigure your xserver by:
dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

If you encounter permission denied on dpkg try:
mount -n -o remount, rw/
- to remount your drive and renew file permission. Currently it says that your under a read only file system.

If success you may now clean your aptitude by:
apt-get clean

Fresh update your aptitude:
apt-get update

Try again dpkg reconfigure:
dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

Your gnome GUI needs some restart:
/etc/init.d/gdm restart

What happens to me gdm stop so after fixing file permission. I remount my Sda1 by:
/etc/init.d/gdm start
- This brings me to my login GUI.

I hope when you reach the end part of this tutorial it helps you solve your problem.

Feel free to post your questions & idea here.

(STEP 1)
# tar -zxvf ioncube_loaders_lin_x86.tar.gz
# cd ioncube

(STEP 2)
- copy the php ioncube to your server root
# cp ioncube-loader-helper.php
Go to: http://localhost/PATH_/ioncube-loader-helper.php

You should see something like this:

PHP Version ___
Operating System Linux
Threaded PHP No
php.ini file /usr/PATH_/php.ini
Required Loader ioncube_loader_lin_#.#.so

(STEP 3)
- make directory under /usr/local and paste the required .so
# cd /usr/local
# mkdir /ioncube
# cp ioncube_loader_lin_#.#.so /usr/local/ioncube

(STEP 4)
Edit php.ini file:
# gedit /etc/php5/apache2/php.ini
OR
# gedit /usr/local/lib/php.ini

- At the end of the code add this
zend_extension = /usr/local/ioncube/ioncube_loader_lin_#.#.so

Save and Exit

Restart the server by typing:
# /etc/init.d/httpd restart

(STEP 5)
To confirm that ioncube is fully working
Go to: http://localhost/PATH_/ioncube-encoded-file.php

You should see something like this:
This file has been successfully decoded. ionCube Loaders are correctly installed.

Next is click on “system” and then choose “users and groups”.
Click create a new user, enter your username, leave homedir in automatic, let webmin pick the user id, select as shell /bin/sh, click on “normal password” and choose a password, leave all other as webmin is offering, and ckick create.

Finally use any of your favorite ftp and you can now access to your FTP.

enjoy!
-Jdam

Last 4 years ago 2nd Software Freedom Day was held in Polytechnic University of the Philippines. I was also there to support the birth of Joomla! CMS. Back then opensource is never been so colorful, unlike today there are a lot of famous variaties of opensource application such as Content Management System, Graphic Software, LAMP easy setup, famous IDE & etc. On one part of my session during afternoon session of Dynamic/ Static CMS (Joomla!), I say to all students & professionals “You should be proud that you are here today. Opensource is more colorful than ever, more knowledge & oportunity for everyone”

See you in the next more event to come…

Some links:

http://www.cp-union.com/cpunion/

http://www.cp-union.com/cpunion/content/2009/06/22/software-freedom-day-2009

http://www.pinoyblender.com/

http://buko.pinoyblender.org/

http://www.joomla.org.ph

[View with PicLens]

Since I don’t have Iphone yet, I’m hoping before I will have my own unit, this issue should be resolve immediately, to avoid consumer panic.

Resources:

http://uk.techcrunch.com/2009/08/28/belgian-teenager-latest-victim-of-exploding-iphone-phenomenon/

#Version 1 “The blue mask of Jdam”

(Early of 2005 to July 2006)

The first version was called ‘The blue mask of Jdam’ and it was very basic made on flash and mambo cms. Unfortunately I lost all traces of that with a hard drive crash.

#Version 2 “Four red planet of technology”

(July 2006 to January 2007)

This was the start of JD’s Technologies logo. The four red planet symbolize north, south, east & west of technology, that inspire me as an opensource enthusiasts.

#Version 3 “Ka-Joomla! – Jdam’s magic trade mark”

(January 2007 to July 2009)

This version is memorable to me and I’m very thankful to have this version. From programmer hobbyist to freelancer and from Joomla! rockstar to Technology Entrepreneur.

#Version 4 “JDAMWEB3 – a Jack of all trades, master of none”

(July 2009 to NOW!)

This is the current version, nice and clean and focused on content! It is the version focus on blogging and my opensource activities. I have decided to change the cms from ModX to Wordpress for so many reason. Now, Its called “JDAMWEB3″ even its a version 4. This is because I’m looking forward for web 3.0 and some more web development together with this version . Stay tuned….

VENUE
G2VC Innovation Center (Offices of Exist and Morp)
5th Floor, The Orient Square
F. Ortigas Road (formerly Emerald Ave.)
Ortigas Center, Pasig City

We will be discussing Joomla, Drupal and other open source CMS.
Special guest is Jay Aguilar, Pinoy developer who works at Google in California.

those who cannot attend can watch live video streaming: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/barcamp-manila