We're Westerners so we're insulated from low level corruption because we can report to the Tourist Police and our local Consulate or Embassy, who will complain to that Quan's MPS.
The kind of low level corruption your mentioning impacts the working class or middle class (the kind living in a 1 bedroom apartment in D10 with a Honda motorbike) because they have no recourse.
That said, the mid-upper level corruption is very significant. How else do you see retired generals and senior party apparatchiks with a $50/mo pension eating steaks at the Landmark 81 and living in a villa in Thao Dien.
And this is why my SO makes it a principle to always speak in English so she doesn't get Vietnamese service.
> And this is why my SO makes it a principle to always speak in English so she doesn't get Vietnamese service.
That's a general recommendation for any overseas Vietnamese (Viet Kieu) to just pretend not to speak Vietnamese any time they interact with officials. They'll never get aggressive and will usually move onto easier prey.
But you are correct the low level corruption is common. A good story I heard was getting the household registration completed at the police station - bring in forms, call back "you forgot to sign this form", go back and sign the form, a couple weeks later you call "oh, it was actually the wrong form, come back", go back sign another form, a couple weeks later "it's not finished yet", a couple weeks later "you're missing one form".
Finally, they go in, finish that form and say "hey, you've been working hard, let me buy you a coffee" and you slip them the equivalent of $10 USD (about 20x the cost of a coffee). Poof, magic, it's done the next day and the cop will even swing by your home to drop off the paperwork.
A lot of the corruption is simply slow-rolling things until what the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act calls "facilitation payments" are made.
The kind of low level corruption your mentioning impacts the working class or middle class (the kind living in a 1 bedroom apartment in D10 with a Honda motorbike) because they have no recourse.
That said, the mid-upper level corruption is very significant. How else do you see retired generals and senior party apparatchiks with a $50/mo pension eating steaks at the Landmark 81 and living in a villa in Thao Dien.
And this is why my SO makes it a principle to always speak in English so she doesn't get Vietnamese service.