On July 13, 2016, Mr. Dale Sherin of Merida contacted The Yucatan Times to report that CFE (the electric utility company) was going to fine him $113,500 pesos for allegedly damaging his electricity meter. TYT published his account of this controversy as a letter to the editor. On Sept 12, 2016, Mr. Sherin followed up with another letter describing the current status of this case. Here is his verbatim letter in its entirety.
After 46 days of gas generated electricity, at a cost of 500 pesos a day , and no response from the court for our two requests to have the electricity reinstated while the legalities are decided, we paid the “fine” of 113500 pesos .
We have not withdrawn our Empado from the courts . We anticipate that is being buried as the positive result will impact all customers of CFE across the country.
We have learned a few things.
In order to fight for your rights here in Merida, you must have patience, perserverence, and a lot of money. The laws are in place, but are not enforced. The systems of arbitration, set up to help people with disputes, have no power and can only make recommendations. There is no system of recompense for costs incurred or inconvenience should one win their dispute. If we should win our case, the CFE will only credit the 10K to the account.
Blackmail is alive and well in Merida. Discrimination is alive and well also. The amount charged was ridiculous, why? Because we are expat’s with a little money and they can as no one stops them.
We are selling out now. We have had enough of being targets. We enjoy our property but are nervous of anyone who comes to our gate now. 15kto20k is just not something we can do at the drop of a hat just because.
Our advice to expat’s in Merida is to live in a gated community of expat’s like Chuburna . If the expat’s are in a community and not disbursed, it is more likely this will not happen as the whole community will know and inquiries will be made. The Mexican nationals are used to this and just pay we have discovered.
We have made inquiries in other states where expat’s are in communities and they help and protect each other . I was told by many expat’s here ” good luck with that” .
We are grateful for the good things and many small kindnesses that have come our way. The corruption is too scary for us, however. I guess that it is well that they just took our money and not our lives.
I wonder if anyone knows that if you take any physical action ,when a person is on your property or not and physically harming or robbing you, you go to jail not the robber or violent people? The police here require proof positive. This means a camera system installation or a big dog. You are not allowed to protect yourself by using force of any kind and the burden of proof is on you to prove who did you harm. Check it out!
Thanks for listening. Or reading . We anticipate our blackmail problem to be resolved in this calendar year.
I do hope this helps expats in awareness.
Best regards,
Dale Sherin
