Dear Claudienne,

I live in the United States. For the past four months I have been communicating with the Companies Office of Jamaica (COJ) in an attempt to register a farm company that I am setting up in Jamaica.

This is a process that they claim should take only a few days. From my experience, however, I believe that claim is “pie in the sky”.

In December 2016, before I officially filed the documents to register the business, I asked the Customer Support Unit (CSU) at the COJ to review the documents.

An officer in the CSU examined my documents and suggested certain changes. The CSU reviewed the documents several times over a two-month period, and I made several changes until the officer said they were “good to go”.

After getting the all-clear from the CSU, we officially filed the documents with confidence. One week later, the COJ informed us by e-mail that our filing had been rejected. We made the changes to the documents as directed by the COJ and filed them again, but the documents were rejected once more. I have amended the official documents several times over the past four months, but the COJ has continued to reject my applications to register the business.

I have also tried to contact the officer in the CSU who had helped me in December, but he has not responded to my e-mail.

A lady in the customer service department told me that she had brought my case to the attention of her manager who would contact me “shortly”. That was a month ago, but after two follow-ups and no response, I became frustrated and sent the COJ an e-mail begging and pleading for help. None came.

I then resubmitted the documents, but they have been rejected by the same case officer on two occasions. Whenever I have made the suggested changes and resubmitted the documents, the CSU has found additional reasons to reject the application.

Beyond the tidy sum that we have wasted on this process, we are missing out on opportunities. We can’t apply for loans, we can’t buy equipment, and we can’t grow the business.

Mind you, I am not trying to do subsistence farming. I am trying to set up a farm which would be well over 100 acres, would hire people, and engage in the export trade. But I’m being defeated at every step by the people who should facilitate me.

I really need some help in order to fathom how to actually get this business established. Instead of sending my application to several different individuals, the COJ should have assigned one case officer to work with me.

We received the most recent rejection notice today (July 7). We had actually picked up the previous rejection on June 30, and on that same date, while at COJ, we made the corrections. We also asked that the person who had rejected it at that time review and confirm that there were no other errors, which she did. We submitted the documents under the impression that this was procedural, only to have it rejected because it went to a new reviewer who found fault with language that no one else had an issue with. She also said we had not signed one of the documents, but that’s not possible, as the previous reviewer would have noticed this.

This perpetual see-saw is beyond frustrating, and all the money that we’ve wasted could have been invested in the business.

I would really appreciate your help.

RO

Dear RO,

Tell Claudienne has been in communication with the COJ, and on July 14 we received an e-mail from the Business Registration Manager stating the following:

“ The complaint has been investigated, and the frequency of the rejections of the application complained of has been confirmed. A review of the Amendment Notices has revealed that there were some common reasons for rejection identified on each rejection. Some of these reasons would have included — but were not limited to — the incorrect dates, the particulars of the officers not completed/consistent/inserted, inappropriate references to the Articles. On the third and fourth submission, however, there were a few new rejection reasons. It is difficult at this point to say whether the new rejection reasons were as a result of new information being presented or not.

We do regret the frustration that RO has experienced in having his company registered, and sincerely apologise for the inconvenience. We would love to ensure that this registration is dealt with without any further delays, and therefore invite RO’s local representative to meet with a Senior Officer of the Business Registration Department to discuss the latest Amendment notice with a view to having any unclear issue clarified and corrected.

Upon resubmission of the application, we are also prepared to offer RO a free-of-cost next-day expedition service on his registration. This will guarantee that he receives his Certificate of Incorporation within one (1) business day (provided that all issues on the Amendment Notice have been complied with). RO or his representative may contact me directly through the email address below to schedule the appointment. We will also be contacting the person who filed the document on his behalf, in case we do not hear from him directly by Monday July 17, 2017.

We thank you for taking the time to reach out to us and for bringing this complaint to our attention.”

Below is the copy of an e-mail from the COJ Public Relations Officer dated July 26, 2017. It was addressed to Tell Claudienne and stated that the registration of your company has now been completed:

“ With regard to the case of RO’s registration of his new company, I can confirm that the registration was completed on Friday, July 21, 2017, after we had sent for the documents via courier. The certificate of incorporation was sent to MK (his local partner) on Monday, July 24, 2017 by our Customer Service Manager.

We do apologise for the inconvenience that was caused. We continue to engage our customers to ensure that the process is seamless and as comfortable as possible.

With regard to the date of interaction, we have checked our system and it confirmed that the first time the company came in for actual registration was on April 6, 2017. Given that no transactions were done for the company prior to April 6, it has been difficult to establish a timeline, the questions asked of the rep, and the answers given. In addition, we have attempted without success to identify the representative that MK (local partner) spoke with to set a date to look over the application. MK is also unable to provide us with the rep’s name.

I have asked our CEO to look through her e-mail to verify if she received an e-mail regarding the matter, and she has confirmed that she is not in receipt of an e-mail bearing or containing the company name or the names of the applicants.

Again, we sincerely apologise for the inconvenience caused.”

We are pleased that your company has finally been registered.

Your most recent e-mail to Tell Claudienne reads:

“ I’m writing to you today to thank you for your intervention, without which we would probably have wasted this whole year trying to do something that ended up taking a single day. It’s surreal that things had to transpire this way. As mentioned, we begged and pleaded for help and were ignored by all the powers that be, but the moment you intervened, suddenly help was their priority.

I’m happy for the outcome, but saddened by how we achieved it. None of this should have been this difficult. If they can fix everything in the space of one day, then there was no need for that much time to have passed. They have individuals doing assessments on paperwork who it’s quite evident haven’t been properly trained. They take your documents, read one page, find something incorrect, [then] reject, and they will keep doing this over and over without consideration of cause to the business or the investors involved.

I hope this is used as a training exercise to improve the quality of service, but I have little faith that this will come to pass. I can only imagine the number of people who remain in the shadows because of how ridiculous the process can be. And I can also imagine the number of people like me who try to do the right thing and are just frustrated at every turn.”

We wish you all the best.

Have a problem with a store, utility or company? Telephone 936-9436, or write to: Tell Claudienne c/o Sunday Finance, Jamaica Observer, 40-42 1/2 Beechwood Avenue, Kingston 5; or e-mail: edwardsc@jamaicaobserver.com . Please include a contact phone number.