Sometimes she would look at her parents and wonder how she could give them a better life. Supertyphoon “Yolanda” destroyed their home, and they haven’t really recovered from the tragedy. Of late, even her future seemed uncertain, with the threat of unemployment looming in the wake of management changes in the workplace.
It was during one such moment of musing that the answer came to the 27-year-old Leyte native in the form of a letter. Never in a million years could she have guessed the message it carried: She had won the grand prize in the Smart Amazing 25 raffle promo. She was now richer by P25 million!
The winner received the check at the PLDT headquarters in Makati from PLDT-Smart chair, chief executive officer and president Manuel V. Pangilinan himself. The telco’s top exec even candidly offered some advice, foremost of which was to continue working in spite of the windfall.
The winner is a longtime subscriber—12 years with PLDT-Smart brand TNT and two years with Smart. A frequent data user, she avails of Smart’s GIGA 50 data bundle every two days. She was chosen from millions of Smart subscribers who joined the raffle by simply dialing *121#, choosing AMAZING 25 on the menu, and following the steps to confirm their registration. Her identity is being withheld for security reasons.
Curiously, she had forgotten about the raffle, so that she was skeptical when the letter arrived.
“Would I be absorbed by the new management? If not, could I find a new job?” Those were the thoughts hounding her at that moment. “I thought it was a scam, so I asked a workmate to read it for me,” she recalled.
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