Visit to Perfect Money Office in Panama

By Mike Seltman
Ecommerce Journal
Friday, August 21, 2009

http://www.ecommerce-journal.com/articles/17608_visit_to_perfect_money_office_in_panama_how_was_it

It has become something usual for Ecommerce Journal edition to conduct journalistic investigation sending its reporters to the offices of different payment systems across the world. So far we have made certain that the Internet users are misled by such payment services as Liberty Reserve, Alter Gold, Numox, EcuMoney and others. This time we decided to check up whether the information about the office of Perfect Money Finance Corp. which is acting at the payment systems market as Perfect Money is authentic.

According to the allegations of the payment system Perfect Money its brick-and-mortar office locates in Panama. Full address as well as glossy photographs of its headquarters the company demonstrates in the special section on its website.

Having just these photos and address information was not enough for us to be sure in reliability of these data. Thus we decided to make a visit to Perfect Money. First, we sent a letter of inquiry to the Support Service asking it to arrange for us a meeting at the office of the company. To our surprise we have received a confirmation.

A reporter of the Ecommerce Journal landed in Panama, the capital of the Republic of Panama, early in the morning and immediately headed for the place specified in the business address: Oficina 207, 2-do piso, Century Tower, Tumba Muerto, Panama, Republica Panama.

He reports: “Before my departure to Panama I consulted Google Maps service to get some idea of the appearance of the office where Perfect Money is supposed to be. After I started from the Panama airport towards the downtown I noticed the eminent building of Century Tower from afar.

“At the reception I was asked where I was going. When I said it was Perfect Money I was looking for they told me the number of the company office. The number turned to be the same as indicated in the address section on the company website. It was 207.

“I rang the bell and a nice girl opened the door. After greetings she invited me to the conference hall. Passing one room I cast a look through a chink and noticed that there were some people working at their desktops. I thought they were programmers or Support Team. Later I decided to verify if I was right and I was told that it was a finance department of the company.

“During our conversation the secretary told me about the future plans of the company as well as the history of Perfect Money Finance Corp. and she also destroyed some myths about the payment system. Well, the information I got wasn’t new to me, it just clarified my surmises. Of the information they provided I was allowed to publish only some facts. They told me that the company is actively upgrading its Support Team and in a short term they will enable Support Service in other languages with phone support.

“On the whole my visit to Perfect Money can be valued as quite successful. My suspicions that the legal address of Perfect Money is just an entry on the website have not been justified. I want to note only one thing. The office was rather small for such a large international company as Perfect Money. On the other hand, maybe it is just a peculiarity of our information era when modern corporations can work with customers all over the world via the Internet while having just a small offline office. In the end we paid our civilities and at a positive note I left the office of Perfect Money and a beautiful city of Panama.”

For further reading:
"Perfect Money VS Liberty Reserve. Which one is the better?", Ecommerce Journal, March 29, 2009
"Exclusive Interview with Perfect Money PR Director", Ecommerce Journal, January 23, 2009
"Interview with Perfect Money payment processor", Ecommerce Journal, July 7, 2008
"New E-Currency: Perfect Money - perfect or not? What are the roots?" Ecommerce Journal, April 18, 2008