The begining of the new year is tax time in the U.S., it is in Ecuador as well. Last February I bought the land in La Paz but because I didn't have my Cedula then I had an attorney buy it for me, to save a whole bunch of problems. A week after the purchase I transferred ownership to myself - I thought. It is a lot easier to transfer property than to buy it without a Cedula. I sure paid enough to have it done and went to Nabon personally to have it recorded in the register of land records. Fast forward to last week, when I went to Nabon to pay my property taxes. The system works the same as paying a utility bill in a small town, women start a conversation with another woman in the front of the line to get ahead of you and men just butt right in front of you, if you let them. I deal with the men but I haven't figured out how to deal with the women. They get pushed around so much in Ecuador I figure I should let it go, so I do. At any rate I had to wait a long time to get to the pay window, just to be told to come back the next day when a specialist would be there to set up my account. Sounds like trouble to me.
I went back to Nabon the next day and went through the waiting in line thing - got on the wrong side of a popular local when he tried to cut in front of me in line. I eventually got to the pay window; they were waiting for me and hauled me into the office to get me straightened out. I got the account set up and the taxes paid but there was a question about who owned the land, so upstairs to the Register of Land Records I went. Another couple of hours, another $145.00 and come back tomorrow for the documents.
The transactions in Ecuador are pretty straight foward and make a lot of sense but the paperwork is just out of control and the number of people and departments a simple transaction goes through is just mind boggling. Ofcourse once the accounts are set up things move pretty fast. It takes less than 5 minutes to pay my electric bill ( I pay in Cuenca for my service in La Paz ), I pay in Cuenca to avoid the lines in La Paz; it is a central system so I can pay anywhere. Once the bank accounts are set up you get free executive banking services without having to wait in lines and the list goes on.
The bottom line is this - Hardheaded doesn't work in Ecuador ( the rules are the rules ) but stupid works really well.
Which makes me wonder if a person who's heading that way could have a few dozen rubber stamps made up, in various "denominations", plus a couple of those thingies to put gold-foil stamps on documents, and just fake it.
ReplyDeleteI haven't really been "anywhere" but have read stories of places like India, where it seems that half the workforce sits behind metal-grilled windows just so they can tell people to go to the next window.
On the other hand, I worked for a state agency where it took 15 levels of approval to buy a stapler. Maybe that's why I quit.
Unrelated: Thanks for the post on La Paz. It's nice to find info on part of the country other than the three largest cities.