Iryn Wee left Manila's call centers during the pandemic and found remote work on onlinejobs.ph within a week. Now she does bookkeeping and virtual assistant work for a Houston real estate company, earning four times her old $250 base salary with weekly pay and better balance for her daughter.
Questions this video answers
40 years old.
Zamboanga City, Philippines (speaks Chavacano).
2008 (she cites starting then).
Around $250 per month (base).
Approximately $400–$450 (language premium).
Chapters
My name is Irene wee. I am 40 years old from Tanzaka Vita, Philippines and I'm a Spanish speaking online Filipino specialist. My employer is a real estate and construction company based in Houston, Texas. I do bookkeeping, project management, collections and general virtual assistants in Spanish. Being honest at work, well, I believe in the value of integrity wherein even though my employer is not looking for me, not messaging me, I make sure that I'm very much responsive. I give them updates as to what I'm doing. I give them all the information that they need. I submit them on time. So basically just doing your job. I'm originally from Zamboanga City. During that time there weren't a lot of opportunities there. When I was in college, my older sister moved to Manila to work at Callsat. I saw that she was doing well so I decided to take the risk as she did. My mom and my daughter came with me when I decided to move to Manila right after graduating. Our local dialect in Zamboanga is Chavacano, one of the few Spanish Creoles in the Philippines. The average Filipino can usually speak three languages, Tagalog, English and their provincial dialect such as Kapampangan, bisaya, Ilocano, Chavacano, etc. Even though our country was colonized by Spain for more than 300 years, Spanish is not spoken in the country. Today. Chavacano can be understood by Hispanics since the base words are the same. But for someone to work professionally, a native Chavacano speaker still needs to take formal lessons in Spanish. When I started in the call center industry, I was offered around $250 per month and during that time it was 2008. For me it was okay, but of course you look for something more. When I transferred, being a Spanish customer service representative, there was a really big difference when it comes to the salary. The Spanish agent would receive a basic salary of around $250 and in addition there'll be a language premium of about $400 to $450. I was with the company in BGC for about three years. Pandemic hit the first month of pandemic I already felt the difficulty because the bills are very much consistent and there's no income coming in. So I decided to look for extra income online and I found another platform. The only thing that I didn't like from that platform was that the point system wherein you have to earn them or buy the points so that you'll have your profile on top. The thing that I like about onlinejobs ph is that they don't have that point system, I am free to look and search for jobs that are available and it's really an advantage for the employees and the employers. I was very lucky that when I made the profile within less than a week I was able to have a client. That's where everything started. I no longer have to do the daily travel like I used to. I can spend more time with my daughter. My daughter would like to pursue tourism because she would like to be a flight attendant and with the income that I am earning in online jobs at ph, I am very much ready to provide her college. The income right now about four times, I would say from the salary that I have in the call centers, I'm able to buy whatever we need. Extras are there. It's no longer a struggle wherein I have to wait for the payday to pay the bills and all that. Right now, income comes on a weekly basis and that is what I'm very much thankful for. When not working, I love watching Korean novellas on Netflix. My favorite shows are Coffee Prince, Jangyum, Crash Landing on youn, and the classic Winter Sonata. Right now I'm watching behind you'd touch episode 17 and I'm so fond of it. Another thing that I love to do is eating out. I love dining out with my family. I love trying new dishes from Filipino to Japanese, Mexican to Korean. I would like to say that this is what I would like to do for the rest of my life.
