Meralco Mobile and Other Helpful Apps for Your Household Management

I don’t want to sound a total digital immigrant as if I had my smartphone just yesterday, but I should honestly say that I really find a number of mobile apps (except those trash) considerably helpful because they provide productivity, convenience, and consolidation of multiple tasks. It’s still worth dropping a short remark of fascination though.

In response to the needs, demands, and preferences of the growing number of smartphone users who shift from traditional to digital means, innovative businesses and organizations continuously develop and improve mobile apps for almost all facets of life — communication, education, banking and finance, commerce, digital content creation and marketing, gaming and entertainment, and even household management.

While there is a plethora of these mobile apps on Google Play and App Store, I’ll provide here a short list of utility and household management apps that I have found helpful on my end. Yes, you may have recently uninstalled some of these because of a bad experience, but I see nothing wrong in revisiting and reconsidering them alongside their promised features and functionalities. After all, efforts are exerted on the developers’ end to make all things work just as what you expect.

[1] Meralco Mobile (Electricity Bill). It is an electricity utility mobile app that gives you the power to access and manage your Meralco account anytime and anywhere (500,000+ Google Play downloads, 3.2/5 ratings and reviews).

• Access and manage your monthly electricity bills and consumption reports online.
• Pay your monthly bills directly to Meralco anytime and anywhere through credit, debit, and other prepaid cards.
• Report power outage and safety concerns and track the status of your inquiries and requests.
• Find the nearest Meralco business centers in your area.
• Compute the electricity consumption costs of your appliances with Appliance Calculator.

Had issues on the website but the app worked, and I was able to register and pay my bills in less than 30 min. Customer support was exceptional and responded within minutes. Maybe I’m lucky that I didn’t run into a lot of issues, but I rate this one 5-stars for my experience. Good job! – Alvin

[2] Globe At Home (Internet Bill). It is but a convenient tool to help you monitor and manage your Globe At Home Postpaid Broadband and/or Globe At Home Prepaid Wifi account (1,000,000+ Google Play downloads, 3.5/5 ratings and reviews, alternative app: myPLDT Smart).

• Manage your Postpaid Broadband or Prepaid Home WiFi account.
• Track your data usage or get more data.
• Top-up or Share-A-Promo to your prepaid Wifi account.
• Check current bill and pay it online.
• Purchase a volume boost for your plan.

 I like this Globe at Home as it tells me immediately how much I owe for the month, when my due date is, and how much data limit I’ve used up and are left for me to use. This is all available on the homepage without the need for me to open the bill. I do have the option to open the bill, too, so that is good. At the same time, I can make the payment through the app as well or reconnect my line, if needed. I also appreciate the updates, notices and new promos that are flashed from time to time. Kudos! – Mae

[3] MetroMart – #1 Grocery Delivery (Grocery). It is an online grocery delivery service app that enables you to purchase items from nearby merchants and have these items delivered right to your doorstep (100,000+ Google Play downloads, 3.4/5 ratings and reviews, alternative app: Puregold Mobile).

• Shop on the app to get groceries and other daily essentials delivered to your doorstep in two hours or less.
• Select from over 30,000 products from different stores for groceries, medicine, pet food, cosmetics, toys, and many more.
• Schedule deliveries at your convenience.
• Save money spent on gas and parking tickets with all online stores offering the same store prices.
• Pay cash on delivery or by credit and debit cards.

Still five star since it gives ease to customers with very busy schedule, especially during these times of pandemic… Hope they can improve the app process since it is very slow to load checkouts and list, and sometimes having error messages with internet connection even if there’s no problem with the internet… Also hope they deliver as when they promised… About the product list, they have everything, just have patience of searching them with different keywords! Good luck! – Maricris

[4] Yummly Recipes & Shopping List (Meal Preparation). It is your smart cooking sidekick mobile app that offers almost everything you need to improve life in the kitchen – recipe recommendations, handy tools, and even helpful videos (5,000,000+ Google Play downloads, 4.6/5 ratings and reviews, alternative app: Tasty).

• Check out its over two million recipes from the best of the best chefs and food bloggers out there.
• Let the app do the thinking for you with its step-by-step recipes, video tutorials, timers, and more handy tools.
• Filter out recipes based on your tastes, allergies, and diets.
• Schedule a recipe to the exact time you want to eat and add it to your meal calendar.
• Add entire recipes to your grocery shopping list.

I’ve downloaded plenty of cooking apps that I’ve vowed to regularly use only to use once and never use again. Yummly is NOT one of those. Yummly collects recipes from blogs and sites and compiles them into a directory with different categories. They have reviews in the app, but to open the recipe, it sends you to an outside blogger website. That said, you can still compile an intuitive grocery list (even tells you which recipe it belongs to). Forever my go-to recipe app! – Devina

[5] Money Manager Expense & Budget (Budget Management). It is a powerful Android app that offers you easy management of finances and assets, tracking of expenses, and generation of spending reports (5,000,000+ Google Play downloads, 4.7/5 ratings and reviews).

• Apply double entry bookkeeping and accounting system.
• Use budget and expenses management functions to make suitable financial inferences and informed decisions.
• Enter settlement dates for your credit and debit cards.
• Transfer figures between assets and business to make more efficient personal and business asset management more efficient.
• Generate spending reports, and review your daily, weekly, and monthly financial data.

I have been using this app since last three years after trying many apps out there. It is a great app and has potential to become a complete accounting book even for small businesses. I would like this app to have the below features which help a lot. 1. View account balances at given date (or as on date). 2. View (& extract into pdf/excel) account(s) for selected period like it is available for income-expense categories. 3. Current UI is simply good but could have been more appealing – Prakash

[6] Tody – Smarter Cleaning (Household Chores). It is a smart to-do list mobile app for household cleaning routines. It puts you in control of your cleaning routines instead of these cleaning routines controlling you (100,000+ Google Play downloads, 4.7/5 ratings and reviews).

• Gain flexibility by managing cleaning tasks by indicators of actual need rather than arbitrary dates.
• Visualize dirtiness to motivate cleaning and visualize the effect of cleaning to enhance satisfaction.
• Turn home cleaning into a game and allow household members to check in and claim credits for their actions.
• Enjoy the extremely easy and intuitive setup of a customized cleaning plan.
• Customize and scale to fit almost any needs.

I love this app so much! It gives my husband anxiety. Lol. However, this app feels like it was made specifically for my brain. I love the layout and the way it functions. I love the suggestions and timelines. I love how the tasks are broken down and the categories. This helps me so much because all of these minuscule tasks are usually just cluttering my brain and overwhelming me. Now I can use this app to get those intrusive and overwhelming thoughts out of my head and into an organized space – Cesiley

[7] Mercury Drug (Drug Store). It allows easy access to its products – high-quality branded and generic medicines, health and personal care products, and household items – and other services wherever you are (50,000+ Google Play downloads, 1.8/5 ratings and reviews).

• Search for the nearest Mercury Drug store.
• Choose Gamot Padala options for medicines and personal health care items for yourself and your loved ones.
• Check on product offers in Suki Sabado Special or Suki Extra Points and free Bantay Kalusugan clinics.
• Inquire about your health condition thru DocTalk, your medicine thru PharMrs, and prices thru Price Inquiry.
• Know more about its customer value cards (Suki Card, Mercury Drug CitiCard, Mercury Drug MyWallet) and other privileges.

Love the order online and pickup feature of the app. Also, the branch locator with contact number is good. I just hope that it offers more features. Wishing that you can check your Suki Points in the app and claim products. Looking forward for the next update! – Lyle

[8] Gawin – Hire Services (Services). It is a powerful mobile app that provides you the fastest and easiest way to find and hire the best local service providers, from plumbers and electricians to photographers, personal trainers, and many more (10,000+ Google Play downloads, 4.4/5 ratings and reviews).

• Submit a request and get up to five (5) quotes and introductions from different service providers to compare from.
• View the service providers’ business profiles, and genuine reviews from past customers.
• Chat, book, and hire the service provider of your choice.

Skeptical at first, but this app does work. I got an AC service request accepted in less than 24 hours, and the AC service I got was very satisfactory. Thank you for existing – JJ

[9] GCash – Buy Load, Pay Bills, Send Money (Mobile Wallet). It is a mobile wallet that lets you instantly pay bills, buy load, send money, shop online, and more – all in the safety and comfort of your home (10,000,000+ Google Play downloads, 4.3/5 ratings and reviews, alternative apps: Bayad Center, Coins.ph Wallet, PayMaya).

• Send money to – Gcash, Coins.ph, PayMaya users, and over 40 banks – real time for free and receive remittances and PayPal funds online.
• Pay your bills and fees to 400+ billers, and through QR at over 70,000 merchant partners.
• Buy load and get a 5% rebate.
• Open a savings account with no initial deposit, invest money for as low as PHP50.00, and extend your budget with GCredit.
• Help restore Philippine forests with GCash Forest.

This is one of the best apps I have so far – an all-in-one application that gives solution to my problems such as buying load and sending money etc. All of my transactions became hassle-free because of this app. I only have one concern. Your load rebate seems to be inconsistent. There are times that when I buy load, I am not able to receive my rebates. Please find solution to this. The consistency of the service you provide should be your top priority – Katherine Jane

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