Flexible work setups pushed to ease Metro traffic

Heavy traffic is seen along Edsa in Pasay City. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/RICHARD A. REYES

MANILA, Philippines — Senate Majority Leader Joel Villanueva has urged government agencies and private companies to always consider the work-from-home arrangement for their employees to help ease vehicular traffic congestion in Metro Manila and other urban areas.

“The Civil Service Commission’s (CSC) Memorandum Circular No. 6, series of 2022. on flexible working arrangement is still in place. We continue to encourage all government agencies to adapt, either work from home, compressed workweek, skeleton workforce, shifting, flexitime or a combination of these as contained in the memo of the CSC,” he said at the Kapihan sa Senado forum on Tuesday.

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“We also encourage our employers in the private sector to adapt telecommuting,” Villanueva added, referring to Republic Act No. 11165 or the Telecommuting Act, which provides a work arrangement that allows private employers to work from an alternative workplace with the use of telecommunication and/or computer technologies.

He noted the soon-to-be-implemented new 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. work schedule for Metro local governments may not be enough to address the traffic problem.

The new work schedule is set to take effect on May 2.

While Villanueva acknowledged the alternative working arrangements may not be applicable to all industries, he said there were some that could actually benefit from it. —TINA G. SANTOS