Wanting to “establish headquarters” in luxury high-rise buildings in central areas of Ho Chi Minh City, but each month the company only spends a few dozen to a few hundred USD. A new type of service has been born to meet the above needs, attracting business people thanks to its low cost and convenience…
Each table is a representative office of a company (four companies rent four tables) in a shared office area of the I-Office building – Photo: TTD
Common reception area of a floor of I-Office (4 Nguyen Dinh Chieu, District 1, HCMC) – Photo: TTD
Customers using this service will be able to choose suitable locations in luxurious buildings in the central area to place signs, print business cards, place telephones, and even organize meetings for a few hours.
Rent… table package
After nearly two years of opening the company, Mr. Vo Nhat Vinh - General Director of VFirst (a company specializing in providing and designing team building programs) - understands that in this relatively new field, setting up a "headquarters" at home (District 8, Ho Chi Minh City) causes many obstacles in finding customers. However, moving the office to a high-rise building in the central area requires renting a large area and the price is beyond the company's financial capacity.
In March 2010, by chance, he discovered the full-service office service of Rolano Office (headquartered on Nguyen Phi Khanh Street, District 1), and Vinh decided to move his “headquarters” to the central area. “Unlike office buildings, this service has many packages suitable for each type of business. The rental area is sometimes only a single desk, which is very suitable for our needs…”, Vinh said.
With four full-time employees, Vinh only rents 10m2.2, just enough for employees to have a place to work. All other services, from reception, meeting room to stationery, tea and water... are included in the service package, the company's employees only focus on their expertise. Mr. Vinh affirmed that the company's operations have improved a lot, information about the company is of interest to more customers.
Located in the rather luxurious Indochina Park Tower (Nguyen Dinh Chieu, District 1), the “representative office” of James Cook University, Brisbane (Australia) is just a single table in the “Shared Office” area provided by I-Office Company. Mr. Nguyen Vinh Quang, the person in charge of the Vietnamese market of this school, said that although there is a mountain of work from finding customers to promoting the school’s brand, he does not have to “have a headache” because of the work outside of his expertise because the whole package is provided.
“When there is a meeting or signing a contract with a partner, just notify the service provider in advance and they will take care of everything. If the meeting time exceeds the service package, you will pay extra, it doesn’t cost much…” – Mr. Quang said.
Save 80-90%
According to Ms. Hoa, an employee of a company specializing in providing office services, by spending only 50-100 USD per month depending on the service package, businesses can set up offices in some luxurious buildings in the center. "Currently, many businesses use this service because of the low cost and convenience for transactions with customers...", Ms. Hoa confided.
The "full-package office rental" service, according to the advertisements of many suppliers, helps businesses save 80-90% in costs compared to renting space to open an office, not to mention saving time.
According to many businesses, the company's reputation is raised to a new level when its name and contact address are in some large buildings in District 1, Ho Chi Minh City. Mr. Thanh, director of an advertising company in District 9, admitted that in addition to solving the "prestige" issue, being more respected by partners when holding meetings or signing contracts right in luxury buildings, finding new customers is also more convenient.
Customers using this service are quite diverse, from businesses in the provinces, including the Northern region, to many businesses in districts in the area. Even some businesses operating right in District 1, Ho Chi Minh City but using rented houses as headquarters, having to frequently change locations (contract ends, landlord terminates contract...) have chosen this service to fix their contact address.
Some companies say this type of service has grown rapidly in recent times, but this model still has no legal basis to regulate it, so it has encountered many difficulties. Management agencies look at this service with suspicion, especially for addresses with hundreds of companies setting up offices.
Funny stories
Besides the conveniences, this type of service also causes a lot of trouble for both service providers and customers. The director of a company specializing in providing this service said that many customers have the “disease” of… forgetting to pay the fee. “There are companies that make appointments five or seven times before transferring the fee because they are busy, and there are customers who disappear without a trace…”, said the director.
An accountant at a company said that even when receiving a phone call reminding them to pay their debts, some business owners even turned around and scolded them. For businesses that default on their payments, service providers consider themselves to have lost money on maintaining phone lines, fax machines, etc.
Another service provider recounted the story of being unfairly asked to pay debts for a whole month just because they had rented their office address to a “hell no” company. Specifically, after letting a company register an office in this building, many people came to collect debts because they thought this was the company’s headquarters, even bringing gangsters to search for them. Panicked, this service provider had to terminate the contract with the company.
There are also some service providers for customers who fall into a “half-laughing, half-crying” situation because the staff on duty schedules meetings for businesses with overlapping locations and times. Mr. T. - a representative of a ceramic import company - said that not long ago, he signed a contract to use the “desk rental” service at a building in the central area. However, according to the schedule, when Mr. T. and his partner from the Netherlands flew in to open the meeting room, they discovered that another company was also starting a meeting. Thanks to his relationship with some businesses in the building, Mr. T. was able to borrow another meeting room to put out the fire.
