A Kaohsiung City resident yesterday complained about finding a large cockroach in a can of food produced by Wei Chuan Foods Corp (
Wei Chuan said it would only offer compensation three times the price of the can of food -- about NT$70. The two sides have not come to any agreement yet.
The unfortunate customer, Tseng Wen-chuan (
Tseng said that by the time he discovered the cockroach, he had already eaten half of the can's contents.
"I was picking through the gluten with my chopsticks when I found a roach," Tseng said. "I felt like puking. My wife vomited right after seeing it," he complained.
Kaohsiung City's health department said the cockroach was two to three centimeters long. The case has been transferred to Taichung County's health department, where the manufacturing factory is located, to determine how the roach got in the can.
Tseng asked for a compensation of NT$2 million but Wei Chuan firmly refused his request. The company said yesterday it would only offer compensation worth three times the price of the can, which meets the lowest requirement in regulations regarding compensation in such cases.
The company said Tseng's request was "unreasonable."
"We have shown our sincerity by visiting Tseng twice before the case was exposed to the health department and the media," the company said. "We also tried to persuade Tseng to return the can of food to us so that we could better determine how the problem arose but he refused our request.
"The value of goods we offered Tseng as a consolation far exceeds the compensation requirements of relevant regulations."
The company said it had offered Tseng a packet of fried shredded meat (
Wei Chuan complained that Tseng posted a picture of the cockroach with the food can on the Internet. The company said it might file a lawsuit against Tseng for this reason after legal consultation. "[Tseng's] action is harmful to traditional industries that have already suffered greatly from the economic depression," the company said.
"Tseng has damaged our company's reputation before responsibility for the incident has been identified," the company said.
The Consumers' Foundation (
On the other hand, the foundation said Tseng's request for compensation was unreasonable. The foundation said that victims in similar cases usually receive either an additional amount of the product concerned with an apology, or a monetary compensation up to several thousand NT dollars.
UPDATED (3:40pm): A suspected gas explosion at a shopping mall in Taichung this morning has killed four people and injured 20 others, as emergency responders continue to investigate. The explosion occurred on the 12th floor of the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi in Situn District (西屯) at 11:33am. One person was declared dead at the scene, while three people were declared deceased later after receiving emergency treatment. Another 20 people sustained major or minor injuries. The Taichung Fire Bureau said it received a report of the explosion at 11:33am and sent rescuers to respond. The cause of the explosion is still under investigation, it said. The National Fire
ACCOUNTABILITY: The incident, which occured at a Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Department Store in Taichung, was allegedly caused by a gas explosion on the 12th floor Shin Kong Group (新光集團) president Richard Wu (吳昕陽) yesterday said the company would take responsibility for an apparent gas explosion that resulted in four deaths and 26 injuries at Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Zhonggang Store in Taichung yesterday. The Taichung Fire Bureau at 11:33am yesterday received a report saying that people were injured after an explosion at the department store on Section 3 of Taiwan Boulevard in Taichung’s Situn District (西屯). It sent 56 ambulances and 136 paramedics to the site, with the people injured sent to Cheng Ching Hospital’s Chung Kang Branch, Wuri Lin Shin Hospital, Taichung Veterans General Hospital or Chung
ALL-IN-ONE: A company in Tainan and another in New Taipei City offer tours to China during which Taiwanese can apply for a Chinese ID card, the source said The National Immigration Agency and national security authorities have identified at least five companies that help Taiwanese apply for Chinese identification cards while traveling in China, a source said yesterday. The issue has garnered attention in the past few months after YouTuber “Pa Chiung” (八炯) said that there are companies in Taiwan that help Taiwanese apply for Chinese documents. Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) last week said that three to five public relations firms in southern and northern Taiwan have allegedly assisted Taiwanese in applying for Chinese ID cards and were under investigation for potential contraventions of the Act Governing
‘LAWFUL USE’: The last time a US warship transited the Taiwan Strait was on Oct. 20 last year, and this week’s transit is the first of US President Donald Trump’s second term Two US military vessels transited the Taiwan Strait from Sunday through early yesterday, the Ministry of National Defense said in a statement, the first such mission since US President Donald Trump took office last month. The two vessels sailed south through the Strait, the ministry said, adding that it closely monitored nearby airspace and waters at the time and observed nothing unusual. The ministry did not name the two vessels, but the US Navy identified them as the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson and the Pathfinder-class survey ship USNS Bowditch. The ships carried out a north-to-south transit from
RSS