More than half of PAL workers takes checks

PHILIPPINE Airlines (PAL) on Friday said more than half of its retrenched workers have received their separation pay as of October 26.
In a statement, PAL said close to 60 percent of the more than 2,300 former employees of the three outsourced PAL units, including former union members participating at the protest campsite in front of the flag carrier’s Inflight Center, lined up at seven distribution points where separation checks were released since October 14.

“Our Human Resource Department at Pasay City accommodated 562 check claimants,” Cielo Villaluna, PAL spokesperson said.

Of those who refused to transfer to PAL’s service providers, more than a third already claimed their checks.

The more than 600 staff who chose to work with the three service providers comprised the first batch of check recipients. The separation checks, partly funded by a $50-million loan from a European bank, comprised the economic package of the P2.6 billion severance bundle ordered by the Department of Labor and Employment and Malacañang.

“The daily crowd of former PAL employees claiming their separation checks is the best proof against the former union officers’ assertion that they are rejecting the package,” Villaluna said.

In Mactan, Cebu, 178 out of the total 206 terminated employees already received their separation checks. The checks of more than 300 union members who participated in the September 27 wildcat strike at the NAIA Terminal 2 that grounded PAL flights for nearly 12 hours, are being withheld pending their final clearance.

Villaluna said components of the package are much higher than industry levels and more than the prescribed benefits under the Labor Code and PAL’s own Collective Bargaining Agreement with its ground workers’ union. –Darwin G. Amojelar, Manila Times