Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III. (Albert Calvelo/Senate PRIB)
MANILA, Philippines—The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) has started the release of the one-time P20,000 pension for qualified pensioners of the Employees’ Compensation Commission (ECC).
Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said in a statement posted on DOLE’s website that ECC pensioners for both the public and private sectors will receive their pension through their accounts.
“The P20,000 financial assistance from the ECC for private sector EC pensioners will be credited to their accounts starting this month of June,” said Bello.
The Social Security System and the Government Service Insurance System, the ECC’s administering agencies for the private and public sectors, will release the financial assistance to the pensioners.
Bello said that the financial assistance will be released in batches across 32,000 pensioners.
ECC Executive Director Stella Zipagan-Banawis said that the qualified pensioners won’t need to apply for the financial assistance as it will be processed in the same manner as the processing of their normal pensions.
“EC pensioners in the private sector with at least one month of permanent partial disability (PPD), permanent total disability (PTD), or survivorship pension from January 1, 2020, to May 31, 2021, will benefit from the one-time financial assistance,” said Banawis.
“The EC pensioners have suffered work-related disability and the COVID-19 pandemic compounded their vulnerability as they deal with undue financial hardships,” added Banawis. “We hope that the one-time financial assistance can ease the financial burdens of our EC pensioners during this trying time. Rest assured that ECC is tirelessly working to provide more assistance to our workers.”
President Rodrigo Duterte signed Administrative Order No. 39, series of 2021, on April 19 that approved the granting of one-time financial assistance of ₱20,000.00 to pensioners in both the public and the private sectors.