Once you are in Hong Kong you need to have a Hong Kong ID and being a domestic helper, I pay only 350 Hong Kong dollar.This Filipina paid HK$35,000 to obtain her fake Hong Kong ID card in the hope that she could get a better-paying job. Although she initially enjoyed the benefit of the HK ID Card by being employed as a dishwasher at a restaurant in Sai Ying Pun, A.B. Balingao ultimately paid a heavier price – 17 months in prison – for the two charges of using a forged document, her Hong Kong ID. As well as breach of the conditions of her stay in Hong Kong.
Balingao was handed the sentence on June 30, after pleading guilty to the three charges. The defense lawyer asked the court to give her a lighter sentence, because Balingao is the sole breadwinner of her family consisting of her parents, four sisters, and three brothers – who are all farmers here in the Philippines, and her two daughters, aged 13 and 11. Balingao's husband has left her for another woman. The reason she committed the crime is because she was trying to earn more money. She knew it was a foolish act and she is remorseful. She has no other means to support her family, and her children will lose their schooling, so she decided to to work as dishwasher at restaurant.
However, Eastern Courts Principal Magistrate Bina Chainrai rejected the defense’s statement, saying that besides Balingao’s “voluntary surrender”, there was no humanitarian ground cited that could lighten the her sentence. Chainrai then handed 15 months for the charge of using a fake HK ID, and two months for the breach of the condition of her stay. We all must be very careful of our actions. Hong Kong really follow the rules and they implement it. She is already earning being a domestic helper, if her family know how to handle their finances the Hong Kong's domestic worker salary is big enough. And besides her family is not disabled and they can find work to help her for their daily needs.
The judge was supposed to give three months of imprisonment to Balingao for the breach of conditions of stay charge, but discounted one month after the she pleaded guilty. Balingao, 31 and from Baguio City, was initially employed as a domestic service worker when she arrived in the territory on March 26, 2014. She then initially worked as a part-time cleaner at the restaurant in Sai Ying Pun, and started working full-time there a few months after. It was unclear whether Balingao was terminated by her original employer or broke her original contract. On February 6, 2015, Balingao tried to en-cash a P12,000-cheque at the HSBC branch on Bonham Street using her fake HKID. A bank official then alerted the authorities after noticing that Balingao’s HKID had a prefix “R”, instead of “X” or “WX” used for foreign domestic workers. She know that she is using a fake HKID but she did not check it very well.
She also know that every transaction we made in Hong Kong, we need to use our HKID. Even if you want to buy sim card for cellphones. Hong Kong is very strict, we must know it. So to all those who want to work abroad, in any country make sure to know what you can do and what you cannot do. We are responsible to our own. Once they find and catch you, you cannot say that you don't know. Ignorance of the law is not an excuse. So it is better that we are aware of what we are doing.
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