A travel agency accredited by the Bureau of Immigration to process Visa Upon Arrival to Chinese tourists denied allegations of involvement to smuggle Chinese nationals into the country through fake VUA.
Peter Paul Lai, president of Cloud Travel and Consultancy Services Corp., said his company never gave false information to facilitate the entry of Chinese nationals through fraudulent VUA, saying they were victims of a syndicate operating in mainland China.
“We had already filed a complaint before the Chinese embassy in Manila against a certain Yi You who is based in Guangzhou, China, that engages the services of local travel agencies to facilitate VUA applicants. Unfortunately, You would duplicate an immigration approved VUA which he would issue to several Chinese tourists wanting to visit the Philippines,” he said.
The BI has deferred the accreditation of the agency after it was reportedly caught duplicating approved visa orders.
“The CTCSC has already submitted a written explanation to Immigration Commissioner Jaime Morente, on why our accreditation should not be canceled and its cash bond should not be forfeited,” he said.
“In its five years of providing efficient service to its clients and transactions with the BI, Cloud Travel has never involved in any illegal activities. We would like to clear our name and reputation since we are also the victims of the syndicate in China,” he said.
The CTCSC also discovered that their company is being used by certain individuals to process Provisional Work Permit, he said, adding the bureau has already been informed of the incident.
Morente said he will not tolerate those who make a mockery of the BI’s our policies and have put up safeguards to ensure that tampering of VUAs will not happen.