#875 – Episode 875: Hiring Help, Social Security, and Crime in Latin America

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came out to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you ex-pat wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started You know, I've been doing this show I think eight years now and of course I get lots of emails But you know some emails you remember and others just fly right by and you forget about them two seconds later But there's one in particular. I remember I think it was after the fifth show that I'd done

[00:48] Some guy wrote me and said, you know It's all well and good that you talk about Latin America living playing doing business, etc But what are you gonna do Johnny when you run out of topics? Well, I don't know if that guy's still listening to the show or not But as Jimmy Durante the old Broadway schnoz used to say I got a million of them And if you remember Jimmy Durante, then well, you're probably homebound in on a respirator Hey all the more reason to come down to Latin America because if you are homebound in on a respirator It's probably costing you upwards of 50 grand a year for the visiting nurses to come in or maybe if you're not paying for it Medicaid or Medicare You know, that's my plan when I'm so old and out of it that I can't think straight or make it up the stairs anymore on my Own I'm gonna hire a full-time living nurse and know what that's gonna set me back

[01:37] probably around four to five hundred bucks a month and she'll double as a cleaning lady cook girl Friday market shopper the works and Surprisingly enough you'll get none of that attitude either, you know, well, I might take the job. What about time off in vacations? What's the pay? How much is overtime? Do I get insurance? How about maternity leave now, you know, if I take the job There's certain things I won't do like windows toilets and ironing You have to remember that this is Latin America and employees don't make demands But of course you have to treat them right and treat them with respect and I'll do the same for you Which is why the locals love working for gringos, but you knew that already, right? Did a whole show on that a while back. So go back and check it out Yeah, and people ask me on the sly all the time Johnny if I have a live-in nurse or a maid

[02:26] Is there anything wrong with hiring a good-looking one? My answer I say well you can but do so at your own risk You're asking for a poop load of trouble. In fact, I'll never forget the time I just built a house in a really nice subdivision and this will happen to you Word gets out that the gringos moving in or anybody's moving in and suddenly people start showing up at your door Asking if you need help, you know prospective maids gardeners looking for a job Now this was in a nice gated guarded community and people knocking at my door weren't people off the street because you can't get past the guard without a reason but since word was out that the new gringo was Moving in a couple of the cleaning ladies and maintenance guys working at the houses nearby Well, they all had a sister brother cousin wife husband Whatever that needed a job and so they'd come through the front gate because they had permission

[03:15] They're working at one of the houses and they'd bring another person along with them and the guard would ask who you got with you And make them sign in and the legit worker would say oh, it's my cousin aunt Whatever going to the new gringos house for a job interview. Nothing wrong with that happens all the time Anyway, I'll never forget the first week. I moved in There must have been 10 people knocking on my door looking for a job and one of them No, two of them were young sexy little girls They couldn't bend more than 16 or 18 years old all made up false eyelashes high heels and all Applying for that cleaning lady job. Yeah, right lots of hidden dangers in doing that so it's not recommended However single men that is single gringos even normally very smart gringos when confronted with that situation

[04:01] can't let the wrong part of their brain get the best of them as What happened to my very wealthy friend who moved to Costa Rica and built himself a nice big mansion You might remember that story. I told it probably three four years ago He had to hire a cleaning lady and in fact two gardeners cuz his property was so big and he ended up hiring a beautiful Sexy little 18 year old cleaning lady who in effect by getting that job had won the lottery because she ended up Marrying the guy and having his kid and my buddy at first as happy as a pig and poop only to find out a year Or two later. She had another kid in the wings She never even told him about and that one of the gardeners he hired who she recommended was the kid's dad Now I gotta tell you after finding that out. He was a much better man than me under those circumstances

[04:49] I'd have blown a gasket all hell would have broke loose for sure Maybe I'd have ended up in jail, but in the end when you think about it He's got no one to blame except himself So by all means hire a cleaning lady but hire the matron Lee motherly type Do that you almost can't go wrong. And here's another tip. Don't hire a cleaning lady or maid That's from the neighborhood. Make sure she lives far enough away that she has to take a chicken bus in Same thing goes for your maintenance men and gardeners You can see the logic in it when you consider that most of the robberies and thefts that go on in Latin America can be traced directly back to your hired help and Those employees that are the worst and sneakiest of all bodyguards Another reason no matter how much dough you have you never want to get one of those Anyway, if in your hiring plan the person or person is working for you have to come from quite a distance

[05:39] At least take a chicken bus in then they're really not connected with the other people in the area They're not in the local grapevine. So then there's little or no temptation to partner up with neighborhood bad boys and no goodness You know what they say boys will be boys But when they don't have friends around to scheme with there's little temptation to steal or get other ideas In fact when I was living in another gated guarded complex the homeowners or condo owners rules within that complex stated Precisely that they wouldn't hire guards nor gardeners for the complex that lived within five kilometers of the subdivision That again was for security reasons and a very good idea because let's say you hire a choppy Adore that's a guy with a machete who takes care of the gardening and weed control and he's from a nearby neighborhood

[06:25] Of course, he wouldn't be living in that subdivision He'd be living slightly outside in one of the little pueblos. You got to know that the cleaning ladies and maintenance guys Will gossip in time. They'll know everything about you your routine and everything you have You can't stop them from gossiping at the dinner table local watering hole or taco palace But if they live quite a ways away from you in another pueblo what they talk about won't hurt you and it won't give cousin Pepe the bad boy and your cleaning ladies family and his mischief making buddies with the neck tattoos any ideas Why logistics they live way too far away to do anything about it That said any place in Latin America, you'll find a really nice first world subdivision There will be a scruffy little beat-up pueblo nearby those little towns and pueblos are where your help is gonna come from

[07:11] So my suggestion based on lots of experience just try to work it out So your gardener maintenance guy and cleaning lady don't come from a pueblo. That's too close by That's why the condo subdivision homeowner rules said they weren't to hire a maintenance worker or gardener that lived within five kilometers of the subdivision I know what you're thinking that's discrimination You could never have a rule like that written up by a condo association in the States. That'd be an invitation to a lawsuit Welcome to Latin America. You got to love it, huh? Speaking of classism cultural bias and discrimination down here. You'll never have a woman gardener Chapia Dora or Maintenance person those are exclusive domains of the mail and it's the opposite for maids cleaning ladies You'll never see a guy not even a gay guy apply for a maid or cleaning lady position

[08:01] And there isn't a gaggle or Google of social justice warriors in the world that can change that fact Speaking of the g-word Google a company I despise you did know Google wasn't just a perverted search engine, right? It's actually a number a mathematical term that existed well before the Internet It came into use just slightly after Carl Sagan's billions and billions Because you know there came a time when billions and billions just wouldn't cut it anymore Just ask those turds in the US government who are keeping track of the national debt So Google actually is a number formally called the Googleplex. That's ten to the hundredth power That's a one with a hundred zeros after it. All right be sure to file that away in the useless information department But I digress as usual. So anyway, there's a good reason why you don't want to hire a cleaning lady maintenance guy

[08:51] Whatever who lives in the immediate area and guys especially single guys You don't want to hire a young girl in high heels and makeup knocking at your door applying for that cleaning lady job Bottom line, you don't want to hire a girl. Let's go get that in Spanish. That means Sexual tease and it's best not to hire a fat or rotund cleaning lady either ask Bitcoin Dan He's got one of those and says she can't go up two steps on a ladder But nice guy that he is he couldn't fire her so he hired another cleaning lady to do what the fat one can't Hmm. Oh and here's another hiring tip It's not a good idea having a cleaning lady and maintenance guy who are husband and wife Oh, where's yet boyfriend and girlfriend? Why because then they can tag team you and cover for each other For example if one of them is chronically late a non-performer a screw-off a drinker or even a thief

[09:40] Oh and note that women are rarely screw-offs and drinkers It's almost always the men and yes because guys need a job their women will cover for them Oh, and by the way expat Eddie who used to own a lot of sushi restaurants throughout Guatemala El Salvador Costa Rica and Nicaragua He told me about a surefire way of how he judged the honesty of certain of his employees That includes cleaning ladies maintenance guys even employees at his sushi restaurants now You may have heard one of the methods a lot of gringles and expats uses to just leave a little money around the house Not a lot, you know, maybe a buck or two or a nice deck of coins some change Just leave it on a counter somewhere for days for weeks if necessary It's not foolproof some workers who do like to steal a bit know that trick so they won't bite

[10:28] But there's a better test the real test that he says was to send them out on a chore to the hardware store Pet store supermarket, whatever you hand him some cash. Tell him what to buy and to bring the receipt back Here's Eddie's trick. He'd have let's say $21 in the local funny money and he'd pass it to his worker without counting it and he'd say quite clearly Here's 20 bucks going by the tortillas or tequila, whatever so he'd say 20 bucks But he'd give him 21 the key being he handed the guy a pile and never counted it out in front of him Well, I think you know how that story turns out. He said slightly less than half the time The maintenance guy would palm the extra buck or two But his cleaning ladies, he said when given the test almost always passed at least nine out of ten did bottom line

[11:15] It's best to hire workers who live far away Women who are homely or matronly and if you're hiring more than one hire workers that don't know each other And as far as that early email asking me if I was ever gonna run out of topics on the expat file show Well, that's like asking if McDonald's is ever gonna run out of food Kim Kardashian out of ass and the Pope out of funny hats in a word. I doubt it I know that's three words, but you get the idea speaking of running out of show topics That's not to say I haven't repeated myself here and there Especially when some of the same themes come up over and over again and as you know things change Though if I do repeat myself, sorry about that, but you get what you pay for right? All right, speaking of emails, how about this one from a guy named barely Truman don't think that's his real name

[12:04] He said hey Johnny a while back you spoke about getting social security or disability direct deposit payments to a Latin American bank and getting them Suddenly cut off. Well, you think it's just a story that happens to others, but it happened to me I'm one of those retired gringo guys living in Medellin, Colombia in the district of Pablo And yes, my US Social Security payments were cut off just last month And I had to take a trip to Bogota the US consulate there went up to the emergency window It's a US citizen window for US citizens only where I was told unless it was truly a life-shattering emergency Like for example a dead or deathly ill gringo or losing or having your passport stolen She said barring emergencies like that. I had to go on the Internet and get an appointment

[12:52] Then I said what about us old people on Social Security or disability? That's what we live on and when you're cut off, man, you're cut off. You're saying that isn't an emergency She says have you gone on the Internet? Have you tried to get an appointment with that? She handed me a little card that had the website on it. Then I said, you know, I'm an old guy I'm an internet illiterate In fact when me and my retired ex-bad buddies get together for card games and to watch Monday Night Football The subject of the Internet in our inept this at using it does come up sure I can send emails use uber Skype and ways But don't think for a minute that me or even most of my buddies learn that stuff on our own We had to have someone usually a millennial program that app stuff for us

[13:37] The lady listened and then she shrugged and gave me a printed notice, which I'm gonna read to you in a second Then she said if you can't navigate the Internet get a friend or a relative to help her go to an Internet cafe Or a hotel business center and ask someone they'll help you. I said, haha I bet you tell that to all the internet illiterates, but I said it in a nice way Then I said what about my 86 year old expat lady friend next door in a wheelchair. She doesn't even have a computer Oh man, I can just see her scooting into an Internet cafe to have the forms printed out It's not gonna happen. Then I said, what if she scooted here in this line? Would you help her? She said of course a physically challenged US citizen in a wheelchair We'd be obliged to help her then I said, all right lady next time I'm coming with my wheelchair and Walker

[14:27] Needless to say Johnny. I was pissed a trip to the embassy for nothing So anyway, Johnny, I walked away from my own embassy slash consulate in disgust Are they not supposed to exist to help out Americans? Why else would these giant buildings and compounds exist? Reminds me of the old cliche knock knock. We're from the government. We're here to help I think not their job as I see it is to make your and my life more not less difficult That goes for what's printed on this handout. She gave me two I've attached a copy for you have a look at it in a nutshell Johnny Here's what it says the US Embassy in Columbia has announced as of February 2019 that the US citizens living in Columbia and receiving social security retirement benefits now have to follow a new

[15:16] Procedure to show quote proof of life unquote then it says according to the embassy announcement Then they've got a US Embassy Columbia dot gov website to click on it says as part of our foreign Enforcement program the Social Security administration has recently informed us that there are over 2,000 Social Security recipients residing in Columbia getting direct deposits to local banks who have not returned the required Quote proof of life form then it says if you have not returned your proof of life form yet Please do so immediately and note that the Social Security administration will suspend all of your benefits if we do not receive the completed form Then it says if your benefits have been suspended

[16:02] Please visit the following link to download the proof of life form and the instructions on how to resubmit your form Then it says please note the US Embassy in Bogota cannot receive or process the forms for Beneficiaries if you mailed your proof of life form to the US Embassy in Bogota, then you have not submitted your form correctly Hmm. So how in the hell you're supposed to know that then it says in order to reinstate your benefits You must take the following actions complete the form SSA-7162 if you've been receiving your payments in your own name or complete form SSA-7161 if you're receiving benefits through a representative payee Then it says where to send the completed form

[16:48] Email a scanned PDF copy of the completed form to SJ region at social security gov Using as the subject heading Feq-country country where you now live last name of the workers record under which you receive benefits for example, if you're in Colombia, you would put Feq-columbia-peres or you can fax it to 506 229 1 0 3 2 in addition You must mail the original completed and signed form to the Social Security administration Wilkes bar data Operations Center. Yada. Yada There's a big address here Wilkes bar, Pennsylvania Then Truman says what a bunch of horseshit then it says upon receipt We will reinstate your benefits within five to ten business days from receiving your email or fax

[17:37] So that's it Johnny. And as you can imagine there are now 2,000 old farts like me Scrambling to work this thing out. That's 2,000 very pissed off retired gringos in Colombia Most of us have missed more than two months of direct deposits They say five to ten working days But that's not right because it takes a month to figure out you didn't get one then you're gonna call your bank They're gonna tell you to wait a few days. Sometimes the payments are late. You'll probably wait a week Oh, and if you're lucky you'll get to talk to someone at the bank who speaks English then you'll call your embassy You'll get put on hold for a half an hour. You'll call back and get put on hold again You'll finally get through and the idiot on the line will give you another number to call the Social Security desk You'll call that number to get a recording that says to leave your phone number and email and they'll get back to you and they will

[18:26] In a couple of days and on and on. Yep. We are the government and we're here to help you. Never forget that Alright, thanks for that Truman kind of tells it all and what you have to go through and dealing with a US embassy So no comments from me. That's the first time. Alright changing gears and slamming on the brakes You've heard me spell out 101 reasons why I would not live work play and or do business in Mexico Well, I take that back. I'd play there on a nice package deal of Cancun That's always nice for a couple of days, but to live work or invest there forget about it now You might say Johnny That's all well and good for you because you don't live there and I hear stories and get emails from gringos and expats All the time living in gringoized areas of Mexico who love it there though

[19:11] You've also heard me say those gringoized places are little islands of security surrounded by hundreds No thousands of kilometers of chaos crime and corruption though I have to tell you along with the emails from gringos with dough living in those gringo communities That we know are now first world expensive I've been getting not just a trickle but a lot of emails from people trying to live the good life in Mexico on the Cheap on just a thousand bucks or so a month a regular social security check But one of the problems you see is if you're gonna live the low-budget lifestyle You're not gonna live in a gated guarded protected gringoize community where you're paying 200 bucks a month maintenance fee for a $300,000 condo like for example in San Miguel Allende a favorite Mexican retirement

[19:58] Destination for gringos with some dough if you live there, you're gonna need it It's a place, you know where even the fruits and the vegetables in the street markets are first world expensive So then what about the tens of thousands of gringos and expats living in Mexico on the cheap? The ones not living in upscale condos in gated guarded communities Let's talk about people in Mexico living on a thousand to fifteen hundred a month Well, if you want to get it from the horse's mouth, you'll pay attention to this email. It just came in it's from Oaxaca Bob He says greetings Johnny from the Oaxacan Altiplano just a bit north of you He says as I write this family members in the US are frying in a heat wave And it seems odd I'm enjoying low 80s delightful weather here on my mile-high front porch in the countryside

[20:44] Just outside the Oaxacan, Mexico capital city, but sad to say all is not well in paradise It seems to date Oaxaca State has been spared the drug gang violence and the other popular pursuits of kidnapping Extortion sex slavery and such plaguing Mexico's borders and drug corridors You see Johnny Oaxaca is off the standard drug routes and chopped up by numerous mountain ranges In other words, it's pretty hard to get around through these areas The thing is Johnny me and the wife have been living a pretty idyllic existence for the past five years Renting a little hundred twenty five dollar a month country casita with good neighbors low crime low prices, etc But here's a little wake-up call to show how things are changing here and otherwise peaceful Oaxaca

[21:34] crime-wise I mean My landlord a 60 something land developer and former Mexico City cop and border coyote Has his own dark history of crime and knowing that guy and him being our landlord has worked Well for my wife and I to date because of him and his reputation People have kept their hands off us for petty crime and other minor annoyances for the most part so far He's been true to anything. He's promised us But it's a bit disquieting when he jokes that any serious local dispute can be resolved easily by Burying his opponents six feet down with his beloved backhoe. He may not be joking Here's the thing last week his 30 something son happened to stop by and I chatted him up

[22:22] About why he and his family were suddenly picking up and moving back to the good old USSA Well, here's the story. Apparently lately his own business of buying and shipping Oxaline goods north has been interrupted by numerous truck jackings at the northern Oaxacan state border His goods have been repeatedly stolen and his drivers kidnapped and beaten up for him The last straw was those threatening phone calls saying they knew where his kids went to school locally here They knew places his wife could be kidnapped and demanded protection money regarding his trucks now Johnny I'm mentioning this because our landlord would never tell us this kind of stuff before We're his prized gringo tenants who often pay six months rent in advance and have vastly improved his property

[23:09] Anyway, his son went on to tell me how a small but ruthless gang has slowly Infiltrated our little town here and are extorting and outright muscling locals out of land, etc The local mayor apparently has told the local police force not to confront them either But to date so far there is no collateral damage to us hapless happy gringo renters But it's a bit disconcerting to see our little Shangri-La developing these cracks now I've got no firm statistics But I'd hazard a guess that this is beginning to happen countrywide in areas that to date have been Untouched by organized crime and delinquency. I've been ever so amazed that the local police response to a lot of this ill behavior Has been almost hands-off completely I attribute that to a failing state overall in the terminal stages of corruption and

[23:59] These days with Mexico in general suffering a radical decline in oil production income The future does not look grozy for Mexico If the governmental and societal rule of law seriously takes a hit the much exalted gringo tourist status could fail to protect us And such fun times as kidnappings extortion and robbery may begin to creep up on us from other criminal gangs besides the government one Though at least the corrupt federal road cops here are fairly benign compared to the cops you hear about Northern Mexico in short Johnny Perhaps this is a good time and a wake-up call to mosey south of south of the border to shop for a country with better Prospects I'm thinking about a place where you get to know your neighbors try to be as energy and food

[24:45] Independent as possible and perhaps unlike Mexico be able to bear arms for your own protection My choice is always the delightful Alte Plano Finally Johnny, we continue to listen to your show every week if we can and always learn something new So keep up the good fight to liberate as many awake USSA comrades as possible, but not too many, please We wouldn't want our rent to go up 20 bucks a month. That would be tragic signed expat Bob O'Haka, Mexico Alright Bob. Thanks for that. I think I'll add a little cream to that coffee sour cream with this article that just came out June 11th Entitled gun rentals make life easier for Mexican criminals and I'll paraphrase a bit It says criminals in Mexico City are increasingly able to rent weapons use them to commit crimes and then return them

[25:34] Confounding Mexican authorities who have often relied on gun tracing as part of their crime fighting efforts over the last month It's come to light that numerous types of firearms can be rented for periods as short as one day in the Mexican capital It says smaller weapons such as 22's or 25 caliber handguns can be rented for as little as 800 pesos a day Around 40 bucks with a 38 revolver costing 1800 pesos around 90 bucks a day Then you've got AR 15 semi-automatic rifles that can be rented quite easily, too It says weapons come from either the US the Mexican Defense Ministry or the cops It says here according to one Mexico City cop in the trade who chose to remain anonymous I wonder why says many cops rent out their guns. It's a way to make extra money since they're paid such low wages

[26:24] He says they don't rent out their own guns. They have serial numbers on them They rent out guns collected from criminal raids with the serial numbers removed Then it says according to a legal gun dealer only identified as Esteban He readily admitted a criminal connection owning 11 handguns and two assault rifles He rents in the morning for between 500 and 3,000 pesos each between 25 and 150 bucks And has them returned every evening. He says they're probably used to hold up buses robbed shops or even kill He says for me. I don't care how they use them as long as I get paid Oh, and he says other criminal groups in Mexico are now using Luma's pistolas Those are one-shot guns disguised as pens Meanwhile Mexico's murder and homicide rate are the highest ever recorded that in a country that has some of the strictest gun control laws

[27:16] Alright be Johnny here You might recall it's almost impossible for a gringo or an expat to own a gun legally in Mexico But according to this article, you can rent one for a day from a cop So you still want to live in Mexico, huh? Good luck with that You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America If you need some help with your own plan B You can schedule a one-on-one phone call with me But first download my free plan B questionnaire at www.thenewexpat.com Better yet if you want to get your plan B going from right up there in the States Just sign up for my 9-hour expat essentials course Get the perfect plan B blueprint by going to the expat files.com slash academy Los bemos