The second stage of consumer voucher distribution starts today. Eligible people who have not yet received their NT$3,600 in consumer vouchers can pick them up at designated post offices.
The Ministry of the Interior said that recipients must present their national identification card, personal stamp and notification letter to receive the vouchers, adding that those who do not wish to pick up their vouchers in person can give their ID, personal stamp and letter to someone else who can collect the vouchers on their behalf.
Chunghwa Post Co president Hu Sheue-yun (胡雪雲) said a total of 1,203 authorized post offices would start distributing vouchers from 1:30pm to 5:30pm. Tomorrow, the distribution time will be from 8:30am to 5:30pm. Those who are still unable to collect them this weekend can pick them up during regular office hours on week days. The deadline for collecting the vouchers is April 30.
Hu said post offices would designate windows for the distribution of consumer vouchers.
A total of NT$19.8 million (US$587,000) in vouchers were unaccounted for after voucher distribution on Jan. 18, when 14,202 centers nationwide dispensed more than NT$82 million to around 92 percent of eligible recipients.
The ministry said at a press conference yesterday that the total value of missing vouchers was NT$11.1 million.
“After the ministry’s first review on missing vouchers that ended on Jan. 23, the total value of missing vouchers decreased from NT$19.8 million to NT$12.2 million,” Vice Minister Chien Tai-lang (簡太郎) said. “As we completed a second review [that] ended at 12pm today, another NT$1,181,100 was deducted from the missing value.”
Chien said the adjustments in numbers were because the ministry found that some distribution center staffers had mistakenly handed out vouchers without making sure the recipient had properly stamped the list with their own personal chop. At some centers, clerks had also handed out extra vouchers by mistake, and many recipients had returned the extra vouchers, he said.
“We’ve recovered only NT$1.1 million from the second recount, which is about NT$600,000 short of the estimated amount of NT$1.8 million — but we tried our best,” Chien said.
When asked if Minister Liao Liou-yi (廖了以) would cover the shortfall from his own pocket as he promised earlier, Chien said Liao is a “man of his word,” but added that the insurance would help cover part of the loss as well. “We’ll wait until after April 30 when the second phase of distribution is over to talk with the insurance companies about how much they will cover.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
The donation of offshore patrol vessel Kinmen to the Philippines includes provisions that protect Taiwanese fishers and facilitate security cooperation across the First Island Chain, officials said yesterday. The comment was made during the Cabinet’s comprehensive administrative report at the legislature after Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Yu-chen (許宇甄) expressed concerns about the decision to give a ship to a country whose coast guard had in 2013 fired on a Taiwanese trawler and killed its captain without provocation. The Cabinet should lay out the safeguards that have been established to prevent the Philippine government from using the Kinmen to harass, expel
GROWING TIES: The CGA is planning a goodwill mission to the Philippines, in what would be the first time since 1975 a Taiwanese paramilitary vessel has visited the country The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) plans to significantly expand its participation in international security cooperative frameworks and its operational capabilities, a budget proposal for next year showed. The budget indicates a transformation of the CGA from a maritime law enforcement arm into a national defense and intelligence gathering entity capable of tackling larger regional security matters. The proposal showed that personnel from the coast guard’s Intelligence Division and Special Action Support Center are to participate in high-level national security talks with the US. As the CGA has dealt with China’s rising “gray zone” threats around Taiwan, it has become a valuable asset to
A patrol vessel donated by the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) to the Philippines was commissioned into the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) on Friday, a Philippine non-governmental organization said. The CGA on Sept. 16 confirmed media reports that Taiwan had donated a retired 500-tonne patrol vessel to the Philippines. The Manila-based We Protect Our Seas (WPS) foundation, which served as an intermediary in the transfer, said that the vessel was formerly the CGA’s 500-tonne petrol vessel Kinmen (CG123). The WPS, in a statement issued on Friday, said the vessel, renamed as the BRP Sarangani, had been commissioned into the PCG the
‘GRAY ZONE’ TACTICS: Beijing sent two China Coast Guard vessels to escort a ‘supposedly private research ship,’ a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman said The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday confirmed that it had recently deployed three patrol vessels to waters in Taiwan’s overlapping exclusive economic zone with the Philippines to monitor three Chinese vessels. CGA Deputy Director-General Hsieh Ching-chin (謝慶欽) said the agency regularly monitors Chinese vessels around Taiwan, and that the deployment south of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, was carried out in accordance with standard procedures. He added that the waters fall within the overlapping exclusive economic zones of Taiwan and the Philippines, which extend 200 nautical miles (370km) from their coastlines. Hsieh made the comments when asked about a
RSS