Editor’s note: A foreign reader sent this story to Tuoi Tre News, narrating his own experience dealing with the customs officers who purportedly demanded money from passengers on their leaving Vietnam at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City.

Harry Hightower said he managed to avoid losing money to the customs officers thanks to the warnings he had learned from travel guide sources, as he recalled in the following story, which exclusively reflects his own view and experience.

I'm so glad that Tuoi Tre News published the article "Passengers beware! Customs officers reportedly wrest money for gifts taken out of Vietnam" to bring to light the bribery that the customs officers demanded from travelers.

You can include this issue among the many that you've very well documented in the recent articles regarding the decline of Vietnam’s tourism industry.

I would be very surprised if the executives don't know about [what the customs officers did]. It's bad enough having to watch your back for scams during a vacation, but dealing with corrupt airport officials is the final insult that travelers have to deal with.

I've recently had the displeasure being one of those people that got held up by customs officers to pay money to get my check-in luggage through.  

I had some foods given by my relatives that should have had no trouble passing through customs; however, the officers held the luggage up and said that I was carrying too many of one of the food items. 

I knew instantly that he wanted me to give him money to get them through because of the experiences that I had read from other travelers on blogs/forums such as Lonely Planet, TripAdvisor, etc...  

Since I was a couple of hours early for the flight, I refused to pay and let him open up the luggage to check because they thought that I would not want to deal with the hassle of putting everything back. 

Knowing that I would not give them money, they again tried giving me a hard time with other bad excuses (i.e. the smell, etc.). 

In the end, they had to let my luggage go through since there was nothing that they could really do with a line of people queuing behind.  

The lady in front of me gave in quickly, and took out the wallet as soon as one of the two officers went through their money-demanding routine.

At first she took a US$20 bill out of her wallet to give to him, but for some reasons, he gave her a paper (ironically, it was a copy of the Tuoi Tre newspaper) and told her to walk outside to put the money in then hand back the paper to him. They did all this right in front of me without any qualm.

To reduce the bribery, they need to put the luggage scanning area out in the open.

Currently, the luggage is being scanned in a room in which travelers need to go in there to get word from the customs officers whether they are "good" or not. 

This privacy allows the officers to demand bribes without consequences.  

That they act as if nothing happens is ludicrous and insulting to your readers' intelligence.

Take the walls around the scanning area down and the number of bribery incidents should be reduced. Not eliminated, but reduced.

Like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter to get the latest news about Vietnam!