Pinay Got Caught Exploiting Kababayans in Canada

This is a common immigration fraud story of Pinoys. You consult with an immigration consultant to process your applications and they ask you for upfront fees. As the applicant, you will pay the fees and wait until something happens, IF something happens. Fraudulent individuals may get away with it in the Philippines but not in Canada.

Eliza Lazaro is a pinay who came to Canada as a live-in caregiver in 1990. In 2008, she started offering immigration consultation without a license from the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council. She has been taking advantage of her clients by asking for upfront fees ranging from $2,500-10,000 to process their work and visa applications to Canada. To her victims’ surprise, no work await any of them when they arrived or they never got to enter Canada at all. Lazaro cheated and lied to them by falsifying their documents.

She was arrested last year and recently pleaded guilty to seven counts of violating the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. She will serve an 11-month jail sentence and pay $23,500 for damages to her victims.

We tend to approach our kababayans for help because we believe that we share something similar. It is very disappointing that someone you thought you can trust has ripped you off. We tend to give our kababayans the benefit of the doubt but there is something we can relearn from this: Trust is something you earn.