Ecuador Eco Volunteer

Archive for the ‘Ecuador Eco Volunteer News’ Category

At the start of every year at Ecuador Eco Volunteer we like to review the progress we made in the previous year as well as look at the obstacles we overcame and areas where we might need improvement.

2011 was a very tough year but the challenges made it all the more rewarding and we have grown and learned a lot not only as a company but as individuals as well. Here are some achievements and milestones we are most proud of from last year:

Achievements and Milestones for 2011

- We moved out of the office we shared with another company to save on rent and moved into our very own office in a much better location on Riobambas main avenida.  The new office is smaller but its nice and intimate as well and since its ours we have complete creative control over the decoration and interior design.  We are paying more for rent but to subsidize that cost we are selling high-quality camping and trekking equipment.

- One of our fantastic volunteers from Austin Texas redesigned the logos and banners for Ecuador Eco Volunteer and Ecuador Eco Adventure. Logos and branding are very important in todays cutthroat world of tourism even for a social enterprise like us and these new logos make us look much more professional than before.

- Over $20,000 was invested into our various volunteer programs in 2011 thanks to our volunteers. This money helps keep programs like the Animal Rescue Center running and increases the quality of life

We also created Volunteer Transparency Graphs and will be updating it every quarter or 3 months in 2012 to increase accountability to our volunteers.

- We have started up a new volunteer program in a Shiwiar Amazon Tribe in a very remote region of the Ecuadorian Amazon. This new program will help the tribe receive an alternative source of income so they do not have to rely on illegal timber loggers and oil companies that wish to extract the rich resources from their land.

What Needs Improvement

As we have grown this year organizing and communicating between the various volunteer programs we run and our volunteers has become more difficult and complex. This has at times led to a breakdown in communication in certain cases.

To resolve this issue in 2012 Jeniffer from Chicago has been visiting all of our volunteer programs around Ecuador to see what works and what needs to be changed to improve the volunteer experience for both the volunteer and the host.

In 2012 Jeniffer will now be working as our Volunteer Supervisor to help make our volunteers time in Ecuador as comfortable as possible. Jennifer will be available to support all our volunteers with any questions or preoccupations they have while traveling in Ecuador from topics as diverse as travel advice to issues with health.

To track our progress from the year before last check out the post I wrote on Ecuador Eco Volunteer Review for 2010

Thankyou for helping us make the Ecuador Eco Volunteer project possible!

best regards,
Jake, Wlady, Jennifer, and Mauri

Hey guys I hope everyone is having a great time over there Christmas and New Years break at the moment.

New Years is always a great time to reflect on the year that past and plan for the oncomming year. If this year coming is the year you want to do something vastly different from anything you have ever experienced before then now is the time to get off the fence and make up your mind.

There are 3 days left between now and New Years and if you want to avoid the price rise and save $100 on a months volunteer work in Ecuador then send us a message and book your place now.

You wont regret it :)

- Jake, Wlady, Jenniffer, and the rest of the Ecuador Eco Volunteer Team.

In 2012 Ecuador Eco Volunteer will be writing personalized and professional Work Reference Letters for volunteers that work with us for a month and over. The main reason for this is to help our volunteers secure a job when they get back home after travelling.

Below is an example Work Reference Letter that we gave to Isaac Manobla from Colorado who volunteered with us for two months at the Paraiso Eco Lodge. Isaac was an exceptional volunteer and helped us tremendously so we put a lot of effort into his Recommendation of Work letter for him in return.

Please note that the Work Reference Letters will always be an honest an accurate assesment of the volunteers time at Ecuador Eco Volunteer. That means the very small percentage of people that volunteer with us and treat the volunteer work as nothing more than cheap accommodation will get the work reference they deserve.

Here is Isaacs Work Reference Letter:

A reminder for anyone that is considering volunteer work with us in 2012. Now is the best time to book your place by paying the $25 admin fee if you want to avoid price rises.

If you have any further questions email us ecuadorecovolunteer@gmail.com

On January the 1st 2012 Ecuador Eco Volunteer will be rising the prices of its volunteer work programs. This is the first time we have raised prices since we started offering volunteer programs in 2007 and the new volunteer fees reflect the increase in running costs that will be explained in detail and as transparently as possible below.

Price Rises From January 1st 2012 and onwards:
$300 per month with $50 admin fee (with the exception of Galapagos Islands and Shiwiar Amazon Tribe)

If you plan to volunteer with us in 2012 and have already paid the $25 admin fee to book your place then you will still be paying the old prices of $225 per month and will also receive a few extra benefits that we will explain below.

If you are considering volunteering with us in 2012 but havent yet booked your place by paying the $25 volunteer fee then now is the time to do it! Email us before December 31st and book your place by paying the $25 admin fee and you will not only save money by getting the old prices but also receive some awesome extras that we will be giving to our volunteers in 2012.

Transparency and Price Rises

We want Ecuador Eco Volunteer to lead an higher standard of accountability and transparency for volunteer work organizations in South America. To help us achieve this goal we have created Transparency Graphs that detail how volunteer fees were used between January and October this year. To access this page hover the mouse over “FAQ” in the navigation bar above and click on Transparency Graphs. Next year new transparency graphs will be added every 3 months.

The volunteer fees after January 1st 2012 will remain proportional to our old pricing structure. That is to say that even with the increased prices 69% of the volunteer fee will still go to our partnering indigenous communities and conservation organizations and the remaining 31% will go towards the running costs of the office.

The $25 increase in the administration fee will help us with the fees associated with hosting and maintaining this website, renewing the domain, as well as answering the many emails we receive.

Reasons for Increasing Volunteer Fees

When we started Ecuador Eco Volunteer it was just Wlady and I working out of his mothers house but as the years have passed and we have grown the running costs for Ecuador Eco Volunteer have also grown. Here are a breakdown of the increase costs:

- As mentioned we will be increasing the amount of money that goes towards the running fees of our volunteer programs by an extra 30% proportional to the old prices. This money is of an enormous benefit to the indigenous communities we partner with as it helps buy things like farming equipment which in turn increases the quality of life for the people of the community. At our conservation programs like the Animal Rescue Center this extra money will be going towards buying more land to protect from deforestation and increase the habitat of its animals.

- Since the beginning of 2010 we moved out of Wladys mums house and started renting an office on the main street in Riobamba. Fortunately the costs to rent the office and to pay for electricity and internet have been divided with a separate transport company called Rioempress that shares the office space with us. At the end of this year however the lease will finish and we will be moving into a new office in a more central location for 2012. This will double the price to rent the office to $300 per month.

- We have had to pay thousands of dollars of lawyers “notariado” fees to keep Ecuador Eco Volunteer / Adventure a legal business under Ecuadorian Law. These papers are a bureaucratic nightmare to obtain and maintain but are necessary for us to stay a certified ecotourism operator in Ecuador. You can see the certifications here.

- We now paying a salary to a new Ecotourism student at the Universidad Politicnica de Riobamba and we are training him to help us as Ecuador Eco Volunteer grows. Keep in mind that most students in Ecuador do not have the chance to work and study at the same time and many traditional travel agencies exploit students for their free labour in exchange for a work experience certificate. We are not like other travel agencies.

- In 2007 our website was hosted on a free and simple blogspot site. When I returned to Australia in 2008 I paid for dedicated web hosting out of my own pocket for the next two years until 2010. Now a small part of the volunteer fee goes towards maintaining the high standards of this very labor intensive website and keeping it running.

- Now that we have translated the website into French (and soon German) we will have to pay specialized staff who speak these languages to answer emails in these languages. This will have no impact on the price for our English speaking volunteers however because the increase in French and German speaking volunteers will subsidize the cost.

Extra Goodies Volunteers Will Get With The New Prices

At $300 per month Ecuador Eco Volunteer still runs some of the best budget volunteer programs available in South America. When you break $300 down it costs around $10 per day to volunteer with us – this is about how much it costs for a cheap hostel in Ecuador. When you volunteer with us however you get much much more than a night in a cheap dorm – you get an experience you will remember for the rest of your life.

- A traditional lunch will be included in all volunteer programs except for the Animal Rescue Center, and Agua Blanca Manabi.
- A personally written work reference will be created for our volunteers who work with us for a month and over.
- An English speaking medical doctor will be available to give free medical advice and health checkups for our volunteers. This added safety net will be useful in case our volunteers get anything from a sprained ankle to a cold to food poisening or travellers diarreah.

If you have any more questions on the new prices please email us at ecuadorecovolunteer@gmail.com and we will be happy to answer you.

Dear Volunteers

I received a disturbing email this morning from an unfortunate volunteer that was in Ecuador, i have not edited any of the information that he has sent me but as you may be able to see he was scammed by another volunteer organization in Ecuador with a hue registration fee.

It seems he did contact us, but as you can read from his mail, he went to the wrong place.

“Dear Wlady
Thanks for your mail. I would like to give some feedback, which is
(unfortunately) negative as well, but I hope I’ll be able to formulate
it better than the previous speaker.

I volunteered in September in Arutam, near Puyo. Before deciding to do
the project, I asked a lot of questions to the contact person in Quito
(sorry, forgot her name for a moment) about the project, to find out
if it really was for me. However, I was never given neither name nor
exact location of the project, even though I asked for it repeatedly.

Somehow I had the idea in my head that the project was part of Ecuador
EcoVolunteer, but when I got to Arutam I learned that it is totally
independent and that I could have arranged everything myself. They
have a website, but since I was unable to get the name of the project,
I would not have been able to find them under all the big volunteer
organisations that operate in Ecuador.

So, to be honest, I feel kind of cheated into paying the 200 dollar
‘registration’ and I would really recommend that you would provide
your volunteers with the option of arranging the projects themselves
for a lesser fee (of, say, 20 dollars). I understand that some people
like the safety of a big organisation, but it seems a bit against the
idea of volunteering that I was deliberately stopped from investing my
money in a good project, rather than in the administration fees.

I hope you can understand my slight anger and disappointment. Again, I
guess you guys do good work and you need some income, but I feel you
sort of cheated me out of my money and I can’t stop to feel a bit of
regret.

I hope you can do something useful with my criticism. A refund would
be awesome and obviously fair in my opinion, but if that’s too much to
ask, then please instead try to reform the policy by promoting the
investment of time and money in the projects you offer rather than in
your own organisation.

Kind regards,

Lotte Woittiez”

WOW!!!! he even mentions our name Ecuador Eco Volunteer, which is funny because we DO NOT charge $200 for registration and far worst we DO NOT HAVE a program named ARUTAM

My immediate reply as follows

“Hello Lote

I think we have a big confusion here

I am sorry ARUTAM is not part of our programs I think you are confused with “ecovolunteerup” we dd not charge you $200, our admin fee is $25, our programs run at $225 per month, I think you sent us an email but never actually got to go anywhere with us, we have currently 2 other volunteers that feel the same way as you do, since they also went via ECOVOLUNTEERUP, some how this organization get people confused, as if it was ours or part of our organization, I am sorry you were ripped off from them, please dont be confused in the future we re a different organization, we would hate to have negative feedback from volunteers that think that they participated with us when they actually got ripped off..

we are not based in Quito, we are based in Riobamba we have two programs in the jungle, both run at $225 per month, and our administration fee is $25 ONLY! unlike other programs i meet each and everyone that comes, so no one forgets about WLADY :)

I hope you understand

hope to hear from you soon. it would help to have some feed back from this”

Currently we have about 4 other volunteers that have come from this org, and are now very happy to have found us, and feel exactly the same way as Lotte does, so do your research properly, choose your organization carefully, and think twice before handing out your money, volunteer work is all about your good will not your hard earned cash.

Sincerely
Wlady
President of EEV