SSS eyes new tack on loans

MANILA, Philippines—The Social Security System (SSS) may have to implement a loan penalty condonation program because of a public outcry over its sudden decision to suspend the grant of salary loans to employees of firms it has classified as “delinquent.”

The state-run pension fund said it recently decided to classify as delinquent those firms that have failed to pay for SSS loans which its past and present employees had defaulted on.

One senior SSS official said the problem was a “newly discovered issue” which the pension fund had to address, even as he expressed surprise by the speed at which members’ access to loans were suspended.

Several employers groups around the country, most notably several business groups from the Visayas, have raised a howl over the sudden suspension, urging the SSS to fix its own internal problems rather than shifting the burden of bad loans to its members.

The official, who asked not to be named, said the SSS would soon come up with a loan penalty condonation program because of the outcry. But he said the condonation would cover only the penalties. The firms would still have to pay the principal of the loans.

The amount of delinquent loans has ballooned to P27.51 billion in recent years.

Anecdotal reports from firms that have been cut off from the pension fund’s salary loan window point to liabilities that have accumulated since the 1980s.

According to the new SSS President and CEO Emilio de Quiros Jr., however, the issue is merely one of strictly implementing existing guidelines so the SSS can achieve its goal of collecting as much as P19 billion in overdue payments over the next three years.

“There are no changes in our policies on salary loans,” De Quiros said. “We are following guidelines that have been existing since 2004. These are found at the back of SSS’s application forms that members and employers agree to comply with when they file salary loan applications.”

Under existing policies, loans are charged 10 percent interest annually for a term of two years and a one percent penalty for overdue payments. Unpaid loans incur continuing interest and penalties.

Employees are required to report existing loans upon transfer to a new company so their employer can continue remitting their payments to SSS. About 87 percent of SSS’ more than six million loan accounts are delinquent, with employed members comprising 83 percent of the unpaid loans.

De Quiros said the SSS has started updating its database on loan accounts and tagged employers with overdue payments, which make their employees ineligible to apply for loans.

He urged employers to get their statement of accounts at their SSS servicing branch as previous efforts to send them by mail have been ineffective. –Daxim Lucas, Philippine Daily Inquirer