Vietnamese officials yesterday visited Phu Quoc Island to handle a dispute between a Taiwanese and a Vietnamese tour operator over outstanding accounts.
The Kien Giang Province Department of Tourism said it would send a task force to study the contracts between Taiwan’s Mega International Travel Service (美加國際旅行社) and the Vietnamese firm, Vietnam’s Thanh Nien newspaper reported.
Mega on Friday and Saturday last week sent nearly 800 tourists to the island for a five-day tour, who were then entrusted to local Vietnamese tour operators.
Photo courtesy of Ziontour (Vietnam)
However, Vietnam WInnER International Travel Co on Saturday asked the 292 tourists under its care to pay US$720 each to continue, saying Mega had only paid one-10th of their tour fees.
Mega had also reportedly not yet paid Vietnam’s Bamboo Airways for the chartered return flights, raising concern that the tourists could become stranded on the island.
The travel agencies and airline reached an agreement to accommodate the travelers and fly them back to Taiwan, despite the outstanding payments.
Photo: Screengrab from Chen’s Facebook page
Yesterday, 613 of the tourists boarded three separate flights to return to Taiwan. The other 150 returned on Tuesday.
The director of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Ho Chi Minh City also went to the airport to see the travelers off.
The Tourism Administration earlier said it was working with the Travel Quality Assurance Association to investigate whether Mega had contravened the Regulations Governing Travel Agencies (旅行業管理規則) and its client contracts.
The association would also help handle customer disputes, it added.
Separately yesterday, another travel agency based in Da Nang, Vietnam, said that Mega is notorious for delaying payments.
The two companies have worked together for about 12 years, Ziontour Vietnam manager Phan Anh Tri said.
Over 2019 and 2020, Mega accumulated outstanding accounts totaling more than US$80,000, of which it has only paid US$10,000, he said, presenting a balance sheet.
Three other tour companies in Da Nang have had the same problem with Mega, with the Taiwanese company giving a down payment to ensure they accept the tour, then delaying full payment, he added.
Mega earlier this week rejected WInnER’s claims, saying that the two had agreed to clear payments on Feb. 26.
It also promised to cover all client losses stemming from the dispute.
In other news, Taiwanese Internet personality Chen Neng-chuang (陳能釧), also known as Wan An Hsiao Chi (晚安小雞), has been arrested and detained by Cambodian police yesterday on charges of spreading false information, Cambodian officials told the Central News Agency, adding that he was neither beaten nor robbed as he had claimed.
Chen on Monday claimed that he was broadcasting live in an industrial park near Cambodia’s Sihanoukville Port, which was reportedly the location where scammers sent Taiwanese to work after luring them with promising jobs and high salaries.
The broadcast appeared to have been interrupted by someone attacking him.
Chen went live on Facebook again on Tuesday evening, saying that he had been robbed of US$3,000.
As of yesterday, Chen had not posted any updates on the social media.
Preah Sihanouk Province Governor Kuoch Chamroeun on Tuesday posted a notice on Facebook asking people for help finding Chen.
Taiwan’s Criminal Investigation Bureau said that it respects the Cambodian police’s right to investigate, and its liaison officer stationed in Cambodia would maintain close contact with Taiwan’s representative office in Cambodia and Cambodian police.
Chen could face charges of inciting discrimination, providing false declaration or illegal interference in the performance of public functions, based on previous cases.
Chen’s previous questionable behaviors include filming in a hospital in Kinmen County without permission in 2012 and claiming that the hospital was haunted.
Additional reporting by Ting Yi
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and
RSS