Armed men held up a remittance center in Barangay (village) Bangkal, Makati City, on Sunday, just minutes after it opened at 7 a.m.
Only two employees of the Western Union branch at the corner of Cailles and Evangelista Streets were inside the establishment when three men walked in, their first customers for the day.
The three, however, declared a heist and tied up the two workers.
One of them was left to watch over the victims as his cohorts ransacked the establishment.
The victims later told the police that while the robbery was ongoing, three police cars passed in front of their establishment, one after the other.
But whenever security guard Yuckcelle Oliverios and Florica Diesta, a customer service clerk, tried to catch the attention of the passing police car, the robbers hit them on the head with their firearms.
When the robbers finally left the establishment, Oliverios and Diesta immediately called up the police.
An initial investigation showed that the thieves made off with more than P500,000 in cash.
Police probers at first were wondering why the remittance shop opened at 7 a.m. when a sign indicated that its business hours began at 8 a.m.
Upon questioning, the victims said their main office had sent out a memorandum to all Western Union branches to inform the employees that they should open an hour earlier on Sundays, Superintendent Jaime Santos, the officer in charge of the Makati Police, said.
“That’s what they said during their initial statement. They haven’t provided us with a copy of the memo they were citing,” he added.
The police said that after ransacking the establishment, the robbers, who were each armed with a short firearm, got into a brown Hyundai Tucson with conduction sticker number 651.
Santos said they were conducting follow-up operations to identify and arrest the robbers.