AboutBill and Lorna Collings Expertise Feel FREE to ask us about traveling, living, relocating, retiring and investing in the Philippines. Guests from 83 countries make our place in Manila an incredible meeting place for world travelers who exchange travel stories and information. We understand both the joys and the hardships of living and traveling in the Philippines.
Experience I arrived in the Philippines in January 1980 to travel for 2 months; I stayed 4 months before reluctantly leaving. I met my Filipina wife, Lorna. an incredible stellar, "one in a million" individual in 1983 in Seoul and we moved to the Philippines in 1986 and opened our 3BR house to world travelers on a budget. After welcoming thousands of guests from 83 nations our place has grown to 30 bedrooms but will never lose its "Home away from Home" atmosphere. Almost everyday at The Townhouse Hotel there's a party-like social scene with vibrant, almost magical energetic conversations between our guests who have the pleasure to meet each other and share their life's many experiences. Sometimes. three groups with conversations in different langauges are going on at the same time.
So we've been exposed to every kind of person from all over the world and shared their experiences.
Publications Suite101.com, eDreams.com, expertcentral.com ( who asked me to apply with allexperts.com since About.com has bought both companies and are in the process of integrating them)
Education/Credentials some college 2-1/2 years - no degree - I've been traveling since I was 18, almost 30 years.
Awards and Honors Luckily, my wife and I have been semi-retired since we were 30 years old, more than 15 years.
Question I am a 61 year old male living on 1500 a month ssd payments.I am wanting to retire to the Philippines and marry my Philippine girlfriend who lives there. I need to know how to handle getting my ssd check with direct deposit to a safe reputable bank in the PI. Can you please give me any advice on what I need to do for a smooth transition of my ssd checks
Thanks for your time
Ed
Answer Hi ED, There seems to be a debatable contravercy regarding this issue cause I know several guys living here on such benefits but according to another questionaire / retiree if you follow the letter of the law you can NOT receive such chacks over a long period of time overseas. If you skim my previous answered questions you will notice this one guy's rebiuttal on my original answer. Now the way to do it may be to deposit such checks in USA Banks and arrange with your bank to have either an ATM Card which can be used here in the RP or some sort of automatic transfer between the govt agency issueing the checks and your USA bank. Ask your USA Bank which banks are they associated with or "sister banks" here in the Philippines then ity's probably better to open an acct here as soon as you know and come back again. We often allow our guestrs in Manila to put our home address when opening a bank acct which reqwuires an address.
So either way it's your choice and your bank will likely be the one to answer any detailed questions. The BEST baks here are METROBANK ( Filipino-Chinese )or ALLIED BANK, both with branches in the USA.
