Inquirer Redux

This is a late post but I just got the picture file of the Inquirer front page that ran a story about PSR on its "ear" - the story on the left side of the logo.

This story was one of the better ones about PSR and it got to the Inquirer front page when I e-mailed it directly to Letty Jimenez Magsanoc and asked her if she was interested in it as an exclusive. Gladly she was, so it ran in PDI as one of their "feel-good-Sunday" stories.

The results were pretty phenomenal. Text volume starting rising immediately and as a result the December Grand Christmas Draw, when PSR gave out P12million in prizes, was a resounding success.

37479197, Housewife, Marikina

It's somewhat comforting to see how settled the routine has become in drawing the PSR weekly winner.

Typically, the big question has to do with who will draw the winner. Usually, Finance Secretary Gary Teves likes to draw the winner entry, at least whenever his schedule permits.

Today, his schedule had an opening at 2 P.M. so the TV crew set up in his Makati office, just as they did two weeks ago.

The process starts with the awarding of last week's winner. After the photo ops with the winner, Sec. Teves, the BIR Commissioners and the PAGCOR representatives all gather around the computer screen. Sec. Teves then starts and stops the electronic tambiolo and announces the winning raffle entry number. A short spiel thereafter and the weekly draw is done.

The crew will then wrap up, quickly edit down the footage into a 15-min. program, burn a DVD and then send off this DVD to ABC 5 studios in Novaliches. The program will be aired shortly after the PBA basketball game tonight, around 10:30 P.M.

Meanwhile, PhilWeb SVP Bobby Mauricio will call the cellphone of the drawn raffle entry number and start the verification process of the official receipt. If all goes well, there should be another millionaire awarded next Friday.

Meanwhile, we're already planning more enhancements to bring added excitement to the program.

An Interview in U.P.

A couple of U.P. students set up an interview on PSR early this morning. There were a lot of questions on the format, what to do, 9777 vs. 9778 ... all the usual basic questions.

Only one or two had heard of the program. None had participated before.

That said, a lot were interested in trying it out. This being U.P., lots of questions were on exactly how PSR helps the BIR and the government.

I told them to check out the websites and watch for the televised weekly draw later tonight on ABC 5.

Another week, another millionaire

PSR version 2007 is settling into a nice pattern. Every Friday, a new millionaire is drawn.

Seems so simple and dependable.

This week, Deputy Commissioner Lilia Guillermo of the BIR came to the PhilWeb office to draw the winning raffle entry number.

We also awarded the P1 million prize to last week's winner, an auditor from the COA. Nice to see a government employee win.

2007: Weekly PSR na!

000031751277

That's the raffle entry number for the new PSR millionaire, which Sec. Teves just drew a few minutes ago.

PSR has moved to a new weekly format, where a new millionaire is drawn every Friday morning. Every so often, the program will have Special Draws offering extra millions, say around Easter or Christmas. The objective is that total prize money for the program will still be the same, on an annual basis.

The draw will be televised tonight on ABC5 at 10:30 PM. Can't wait to see how that rates.

A new record!

1,133,485 raffle entries were given out yesterday, December 19, 2006.

That's the record high number of raffle entries PSR has given out in one day. All is looking good for the Grand Christmas Draw at noon today, when we raffle off P12 million in prizes.

Inquirer's Front Page Today

She thought ‘Premyo Sa Resibo’ P1-M prize a hoax
By Joel Tan
Inquirer
Last updated 01:34am (Mla time) 12/17/2006

Published on page A1 of the December 17, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
Also on Inq7.net: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view_article.php?article_id=38716

MINELA Dolor had never won a raffle. So it was a great leap of faith for her to send a text entry to the Bureau of Internal Revenue and Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp.’s “Premyo sa Resibo” promo.

A month later, Dolor was deluged with calls informing her that she had won a million pesos.

“But I ignored the calls,” she said in an interview during the award ceremonies at the PhilWeb office, promo partner of the BIR and Pagcor.

Premyo Sa Resibo is a nationwide text raffle started by the BIR and Pagcor with the objective of motivating consumers to always ask for a receipt whenever they purchase goods or services.

The program will help boost the tax collection drive campaign of the BIR in plugging billions of pesos in tax leaks due to non-issuance of receipts and misdeclaration of sales.

Consumers simply text in their receipt numbers and they are given raffle numbers which are entered into a monthly raffle. The program, which started in June 2006, has already given out P23 million in prizes.

Dolor attributed her hesitation to her fear of scams and hoaxes. Because of this, the 25-year-old resident of Ilocos Sur almost forfeited her P1-million prize.

Based on the promo rules, winners who fail to claim their money 60 days after a draw date automatically forfeit the prize.

“Actually, I could have just checked the Premyo Sa Resibo website (www.premyosaresibo.com.ph) or called their help line at 338-9777. I would have gotten all the info I needed,” she said, on hindsight.

Fate, however, was smiling on the young woman. A few days before the end of the 60-day period, a distant relative who worked for the BIR dropped by Dolor’s house and told her about her windfall.

Dolor immediately sent word to PhilWeb, the BIR and Pagcor, and prepared for her eight-hour trip to Metro Manila.

“It’s surreal,” she said. “Every day I hear about people winning the lottery, the sweepstakes, raffles at malls, but I’ve never met any of them. Now that I’ve won, I believe.”

Grand prize draw

The Premyo sa Resibo Grand Christmas Draw is on Dec. 20 where another P12 million in prizes will be given out bringing the total cash payout for 2006 to a whopping P35 million. Winners are given 60 days to claim their prizes.

Dolor said she would invest her prize money in a small business, if not in Ilocos Sur, then surely in her parent’s hometown of San Fernando, La Union.

“Since I’m jobless now, I might as well start a small business with the money. The timing couldn’t be more perfect,” she said.

Dolor’s advice to aspiring winners? Temper caution with optimism.

“My hesitation almost cost me a million pesos. I should have at least tried to check if I had won, but I didn’t. I was fortunate someone went out of her way to inform me,” she said.

Joining Premyo Sa Resibo is easy. For details, text PSR HELP to 9777 or call Tel. No. 338-9777.


Copyright 2006 Inquirer. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Grand Christmas Draw

Of course, we had to take full advantage of Onyok's wife having won in the November Draw. We developed this ad but weren't able to run it more than once.

We found out a week ago that Sec. Teves wouldn't be able to attend the Dec. 1 Draw. After some quick thinking, we decided that the best recourse was to combine the December and January draws into one big, "Grand Christmas Draw."

The second picture is the ad we created for the combined draw, where we basically combined the prizes to get to a whopping P12 million give-away.

Location, location, location

During the October 4 Draw at Pagcor's Airport Casino Theater, I was seated with officials from Pagcor, Dept. of Finance and the BIR. Someone commented that the theater was beautiful but empty. PSR would benefit if it could conduct its A2PSR tapings and monthly draws in shopping malls.

Comm. L from the BIR volunteered to connect me with Ricky Lim, Comptroller of SM, and her kumpadre. I met with him the next day. In the "let's connect" phase of get-to-know-you, which seems to start most business meetings, I found out that Ricky Lim was a UP professor of accounting and taught my older brother. The SM group has always been supportive of BIR programs and immediately sent us a list of possible mall venues and dates.

On October 10, we did our first mall taping at SM San Lazaro. The constantly evolving A2PSR was yet entering into another improvement phase.

ABC5

The previous, televised, PSR live draws had been handled IBC 13. Starting the October 4 Draw, we switched over to ABC5, which offered us a cheaper rate and higher viewership.

The big risk with ABC was that we were also switching to a new, daily time slot - 11 P.M. Hence, in some ways the switchover was really bringing us a completely new audience, very different from the NBN, post-Lotto viewer at 9:15 P.M.

In fact, our Nielsen ratings did increase from the switchover, but text volumes were still not climbing as fast as we wanted them to.

Iba Tayo! but was it different enough?

Win-win

A2PSR was conceived as a win-win for all concerned.

PSR benefited by having daily TV exposure for the program, convincing the Lotto TV crowd that here was another game that they could play. Plus, since PSR is text-based, it is actually easier to join than Lotto. My calculations showed that the total monthly cost of running a daily, 15-min. TV show was less than a typical, multi-million peso, two-week, TVC blast.

NBN benefited by getting a TV show that would hopefully attract viewers. Of course, we neglected to settle the issue of who would pay for the production. NBN, in effect, contributed their Studio 1 and production crew to the effort. By the end of September, J and I still could not agree on a price for this service. As of today, NBN has never billed us for our time working with them.

B and Malayan Insurance benefited since they insured the prizes and, as of today, have received more in insurance premiums than the minor prizes they have given out. In almost three months of running the show, no one has ever picked a straight flush - thus, no one has won the P1 million on offer each day.

So did everyone actually benefit from A2PSR?

PSR itself did not truly see massive growth in text entries. Most marketing people I talked to found it innovative to use a TV show to promote PSR and save on TVC costs, but I think the channel and the time slot just did not get PSR enough viewership. In short, the only clear winner was actually the insurer.

On October 4, the Third Monthly Draw, after less than one month with NBN, we moved A2PSR to ABC5.

A2PSR version 2.0 was on.

A2PSR version 1.0

In early September, I met B, who introduced me to the idea of prize idemnity. The idea is to offer a prize - say P1 million - available to a contestant that can accomplish something - say pick a certain combination of cards from a deck.

Many contests already offer these, the most familiar probably being the Hole-in-One prize in a golf tournament. The tournament organizer, in order to manage his risk, insures the Hole-in-One prize. If a golfer manages to actually accomplish the trick, then the insurance company bears the cost of the prize, usually a car.

B's innovative idea for PSR was to offer P1 million a day, assuming a contestant could pick out a straight flush from a 20-card deck composed of only Aces, Kings, Queens, Jacks and Tens. I built on the idea proposing to R that we put this on TV instead of our usual 30-sec. TV spots. B would get Malayan Insurance to insure the P30 million plus in prizes that would be at stake during the daily show.

R agreed and with his customary speed made a few phone calls. The next day, I had a meeting with J, the head of NBN - a government TV station that also showed the Lotto draw at 9PM each night. J agreed to the idea of a TV show for PSR, to be shown immediately after each Lotto draw.

Within days, I had to find a stage designer, hosts, crew, etc., etc., including a name for the show. R made the final call on the latter - "Araw-araw, Premyo Sa Resibo" - which we quickly shortened to A2PSR.

One week later, on September 10, we aired our first A2PSR show.

Radio

Working at their customary lightspeed, blackpencil created a radio ad for PSR in exactly 14 days. Our biggest decisions were to use a female singer, an upbeat pop rhythm and a male end VO. I should have the ad uploaded on the website by tomorrow.

We're on Inq7.net!

I asked J.V. Rufino, the editor-in-chief of Inq7.net, if he could post the PSR winners on the website, alongside the Lotto winners. J.V. was super nice and agreed. After all, both Lotto and PSR are government programs.

The details took about a week to work out, as our IT group had to send theirs an RSS feed. Today, the results went up on the Inq7.net front page.

Check it out at www.inq7.net.

A Technical Digression

I thought it might be interesting (har!) to talk about the difference between MO and MT. Those readers who dislike anything tech-oriented may just want to skip all this. On the other hand, those who are actual techies might enjoy this. (The prospect of a non-techie discussing technicalities is always an opportunity for a good laugh.) So here goes.

When PSR was in originally in development (Smart's 9777 service), it was designed as a "mobile-originated" or MO system. The MO system is relatively simple: a text cannot be sent unless there is sufficient load.

To the Telco and the VAS Content Provider, MO makes accounting relatively simple. Number of texts received x Text Price = Total Revenue from the Value-Added Service.

I'm not sure how many VAS providers use this system but I would think a lot do. Under this system, the only point of accounting contention is the actual count of texts.

(Surprisingly, a lot of CP's report large discrepancies in their text count vs. that of the Telcos. This must mean that there are VAS providers that don't properly program MO systems or that there are Telcos that can't count, but as columnist Vic Agustin likes to say, "That is another story.")

MO does have its disadvantages. One of these is that there is a fixed charge per text. As we discovered when we tried to launch the PSR 9778 service, which has a variable charge depending on the amount of the Official Receipt, we needed to write a different program for the new service.

Enter the MT or mobile-terminated system. In this system, the sender's text is sent to the CP's server, which checks on how much to charge the sender. The "charge" is then forwarded to the Telco's server. If the charge is approved, the Telco server "replies" to the CP server, which then sends an appropriate Acknowledgement Text to the sender.

Since the Telco server was involved in the process, presumably all charges are captured and there is even less room for any discrepancies between Telco count and that of the VAS provider.

One disadvantage of this system is the number of texts that need to be sent back and forth, which can lead to system clogging. I guess this is one reason why Telcos now have servers with speeds measured in Texts Per Second or TPS.

The Smart 9778 system was therefore designed and launched as an MT system. I still have to check but this might have been the first VAS with a variable charge ranging from P6.00 to P1,500 (since the minimum is a P350 Official Receipt or 4 raffle entries and the maximum is a P100,000 Official Receipt or 1,000 raffle entries).

When we began discussions with Globe, it was clear that it would not be possible to do exactly the same thing as Smart. Both Globe's 9777 and 9778 services are MT, something they demand from all their CP's.

In the case of the Globe 9778 service though, it was not possible to send in a completely variable charge. Instead, the amount charged needed to fit one or more of Globe's existing "baskets" for mobile charges. These baskets ranged from P1.50, P2.50, P3.00, P4.50, P5.00, P10.00, P15.00, P30.00, etc.

Thus, a charge for 5 raffle entries or P7.50 might mean an initial charge of P5.00 followed by a second charge of P2.50 (since there is no P7.50 basket). Of course, the disadvantage of this is that there are now even more texts flying around the system.

On the other hand, the plus side is that a text entry with only enough load to partially cover the total raffle entries would still get partial approval, while in the Smart 9778 case, it was "all or nothing."

As one can imagine from all the above, the PSR program really had to break new ground in the software development side of its text handling systems. Little wonder that Smart 9778 was launched almost two months after 9777, while the dual Globe MT service took about 5 weeks to develop.

I should add a final word about Sun. What they have is an MO system, making it difficult to give them a 9778 service. Technically, a Sun subscriber who buys something for P100,000 would need to send in 1,000 texts to fully avail of their raffle entry entitlements. Interestingly, we haven't heard any complaints from their subscribers.

Onyok Wins!

Here's a heartwarming story from this month's winners: it turns out one of our winners is Onyok Velasco, the Olympic boxing silver medalist who (in the hearts and minds of many Filipinos) was robbed of what should have been our country's first Olympic gold medal.

The beautiful part is that Onyok's wife gave birth to a healthy baby girl the day after the draw. She didn't make it to the Awarding Ceremonies today as she was still indisposed. Still the cash should come in handy for this good-looking couple, who really need the good luck! Onyok joked that he would name the baby "Resibo."

Onyok came to the Awarding to personally collect his check from Finance Sec. Gary Teves, and naturally the media guys were all over him. His clip made all the evening TV news reports. Let's hope this means more people think about JOINING PSR!

The Fourth Draw - SM Mall of Asia

I just read through my earlier post on the Third Draw last October 4 at the Pagcor Airport Casino and it is amazing how alike this one came off.

Finance Sec Gary Teves arrived at 12:55, just 10 minutes later than he did last time, but still just in time for the 1pm live airing. The Finance press had come in just earlier and the entertainment reporters were also around as we had held a special presscon for the latter earlier.

The actual show ran long again, 20 minutes instead of the alloted 15, but I doubt that ABC 5 will be complaining. Last month, we ran 20:14, so it's kinda amazing how the time came up virtually the same.

The electronic tambiolo did its job, as usual, but there was another minor error. At the end of the draw, J.M. was supposed to press Esc and then the 5 winning raffle entry numbers would be flashed on screen. He hit the Esc button twice though, so the screen went all the way to the Windows page. Next time, we will have to slightly reprogram to ensure that the Winner's Page is properly displayed.

All in all, it was a good draw and the crowd at the Mall was enthusiastic. The SM malls have been great for PSR, as the public venue allows us to distribute about 5,000 flyers on the average during a taping day.

Our contacts in the BIR also reported a bit of good news. Their Requests for Approval of Official Receipts have been increasing. They attribute this to businesses having to issue more OR's - partially due to the success of PSR in getting consumers to ask for OR's.

Just another step towards making PSR a better program.

The Sun Also Rises...

I actually can't recall whether the Sun service started before or after Globe. Suffice it to say that total entries from Sun just don't "move the needle." The only nice thing is that the guys from the third telco have been great to work with - very supportive and aggressive. But then they oughta be.

And then there was Globe...

Shortly after the August 1 draw, the Globe service finally came up, both for 9777 and 9778. Text entries immediately increased, as the new telco's subscribers had been waiting to enter PSR from its beginnings in June.

The first enhancement: 9778

One of the difficulties with PSR was its "one text, one entry" format. Not many consumers bothered to text in the full complement of raffle entries their OR was entitled to.

Imagine, for example, if you had bought a P100,000 laptop entitling you to 1,000 raffle entries. You might text in once, maybe even a few more times, but after awhile, you just couldn't be bothered to keep texting.

We quickly realized the need for a "single text, multiple raffle entry" enhancement to PSR. We decided to call this 9778, as the texters would now text in to a different number from 9777.

Getting this implemented was more difficult than we thought. A new Service Description (SD) was necessary and this had to be approved by Smart's VAS, finance, legal, tax, etc. groups. The number of sign-offs was incredible.

The programming was by no means simple either. For the first time, Smart would have to deal with a variable charge per text, since the price would depend on the value of the OR being texted in.

Discussions were held on what to do if the texter did not have enough load for the charge. This wasn't a key issue at P1.50 per text, but became a debate considering the average texter's load is only P30.

The first raffle draw was scheduled for August 1, 2006 and with entries crawling in at the 9777 pace, it was critical to get the new enhancement started up quickly. Our 9778 print ads were already being developed even before we knew the service could begin.

Finally, on July 28, just three days before the draw, the service was opened up to the public. Amazingly, the volume of entries in 9778 overtook the 9777 entries within a couple of weeks of launch.