PhilHealth ordered to return P247.9M

The Commission on Audit (COA) has ordered the Philippine Health Insurance Corp. (PhilHealth) to return P247.88 million in unauthorized benefits given to its employees.

In two separate decisions, the COA affirmed the 13 notices of disallowance (NDs) issued from January 2009 to April 2010 on various employee bonuses and allowances.

The COA did not even discuss 11 of these NDs covering P229.36 million. It rejected outright the petitions of former president and chief executive officer Eduardo Banzon because they were elevated to the commission proper beyond the allowable 180-day period.

“Having attained finality, the decision is immutable and unalterable, and may no longer be modified in any respect,” the COA said.

Meanwhile, it affirmed the disallowance of P16.28 million paid to employees as an “efficiency gift” for the year 2007, on the ground of lack of approval from the Office of the President.

The COA rejected PhilHealth’s argument that it was exempted from the Salary Standardization Law and had autonomy to grant the benefits by virtue of the National Health Insurance Act of 1995.

The decision noted that the authority of the PhilHealth board of directors to fix their own compensation and position classification system is “not absolute,” because it is “still duty-bound to observe guidelines and policies” and report its compensation plans to the President to ensure compliance with the law.

The COA said PhilHealth cannot claim to be in good faith, because Section 6 of Presidential Decree No. 1597 required it to secure first the approval of the Office of the President and the Department of Budget and Management.