It’s a hassle to transfer PayPal money for Malaysians. I do not know why it’s taking PayPal and the Malaysian banking authorities so long to provide this much needed service. It’s been quite some time since PayPal opened their regional headquarters in Singapore.

Anyway, I think the most hassle free way to transfer your virtual PayPal money into rock-solid bank notes is to simply head down to Singapore for a holiday, open up a POSB Bank account and then simply do a bank transfer to the Singapore bank account. I have done it and it’s completed really fast.

Here’s how. Head down to any POSB branch and open up a bank account. You can simply open a bank account with just a Malaysian IC. No need passport or any other crap. Cool right? Some features for you to consider with this POSB account - Internet banking and MasterCard Debit Card. I’m still waiting for my Internet banking package to arrive. But the MasterCard Debit Card is the single most useful piece of feature from my POSB account. It works exactly like a Credit Card and can be used online anywhere. It’s how I validate my PayPal.

I wanted this same Debit Card with my Maybank, but sadly they don’t provide it. Their Visa Debit Card can’t be used online. What crap.

Anyway, once you opened up your POSB Bank account, use the following details to key into your PayPal account. This is provided to me by a POSB Bank officer and it works perfectly fine for me.

Bank Name: DBS Bank Ltd.
Bank Code: 7171
Branch Code: 081
Account Type: Saving

The bank name is DBS because POSB is owned by DBS. Oh do note, if you are above 21 years old, you need to maintain a S$500 deposit balance else they will deduct S$2 per month (if I’m not wrong).

The entire process took about 3 working days before the money appear in my POSB account. Cool stuff I would say. Oh PayPal will deduct S$1 for bank transfer of less than S$200.

If you need to check your bank balance or report stolen DBS debit card, call this number: +65-6327 2265
And if you need to call PayPal for any reason, call this number: +65-6510 4650
Oh this PayPal number will be rerouted to a Shanghal call centre, so have fun talking there!

Don’t be discouraged to call the Singapore numbers listed above. It’s actually quite cheap to call Singapore. If you are on Digi, you can call Singapore for 18sen/minute. I’m not joking. This is serious shit. It’s cheaper than calling my neighbour on his mobile phone! I saw some adverts for Maxis and Celcom too, but I’m not too sure the exact price to call Singapore, but you can try for about 1 minute to get a rough gauge of the price. It won’t slaughter you, that’s for sure.

Hope this helps.

I’ve gotten my Facebook vanity URL @ http://www.facebook.com/bobbyong. Have you gotten yours? Better be quick before your choice facebook vanity name is taken out. Choose properly yea cause you can’t change it later.

Btw this is cool. The person chose default.aspx as the vanity URL to make it seem like the default landing page of Facebook. Check out the TechCrunch article here.

Note: it seems like Facebook has removed the default.aspx page.

I had to renew my passport a few days back because there was less than 6 months validity and I could not travel outside Malaysia. The rush was induced because I was supposed to go to Singapore for an interview today.

Anyway, being the Internet person I am, I just need to Google for information on renewing my passport. I hopped on to the Malaysian Immigration Department website. It’s ugly I know, but I got some rather useful information that surprised me.

First I found out that students intending to go overseas to study can apply/renew their passports for half the usual rates. A normal Malaysian passport renewal will cost RM300 but if you can prove you are going overseas to further your studies, you need to pay only RM150. Click here to read the details yourself from the Immigration website.

I called up the Immigration Department to confirm this and checked on the things I need to bring. All I need is the Acceptance Letter from the overseas university. I had 2 letters - 1 from Berkeley and 1 from UCL though it’s an conditional offer letter.

I decided to use my UCL Conditional Offer Letter to apply for the special rate. I brought along my Singapore-GCE A-Level results to verify that I have met the university’s criteria and have been confirmed a spot in UCL. (I’ve yet to receive my Unconditional Offer Letter, God knows why UCL’s taking such a long time to change the Conditional to Unconditional though my results had been on UCAS for quite some time already)

Talked to the officer and after verifying the documents (you need to bring photocopies of the Offer Letter and results if it’s conditional), I was allowed the student rate. Note: just bring the all the documents including the envelope the university sent to you cause the officer might be skeptical. Did a few extra documentations - nothing additional to fill up, merely questions by the officers and many thumbprints on the thumbprint reader. After an additional 15 minutes or so, I paid my RM150 instead of RM300 for my new passport. What a bargain!

Now for the 2nd surprise. I called up Immigration Department to check what I need to bring to renew my passport (just 2 passport photos, old passport, photocopy of IC, RM150, Uni Offer Letter, Results if applicable) and asked them which department is the fastest. My family normally go to the old Subang airport for passport application/renewal purposes and was simply told by the officer that the branch in Subang is the smallest one in Klang Valley!

I should go to Shah Alam or Pusat Bandar Damansara instead. There are more counters there. And the surprising part is THEY OPEN ON SATURDAYS AND SUNDAYS!!! From 8am to 1pm! WOW. Our immigration departments (though only several) are open on weekends! I’m so proud of this.

It was real easy. I do not need to take leave from office. Dad don’t need to take leave from work. Sis don’t need to ponteng school. We all renewed our passport in Pusat Bandar Damansara on Sundays where they have 40 counters! We collected our passport 3 hours after paying our money. Just spent the whole morning and we sorted our documents to travel again! (Note: the counters stop giving out numbers by 11am)

Also, do not go to Putrajaya to renew your passport. The department there is mainly for Diplomatic passports. They produce only 40 normal passports per day ONLY though the officer told me there are plans to make it open for public in the future.