- CHERYL G. CRUZ
The Social Security System is proposing a partnership with the Bacolod City government on assistance with the remittance of social security and employee’s compensation contributions of contract of service (COS) and job order (JO) personnel.
The proposed memorandum of agreement between the city government and the SSS, to be represented by its executive vice president for Branch Operations Sector, Atty. Voltaire Agas, and senior VP for Visayas Operations Group, Helen Solito, is pending before the Committee on Laws, Ordinances and Good Government.
SSS Bacolod and several barangays of the highly-urbanized city, including Singcang-Airport, Taculing, and Brgy. 10, had inked MOAs for the social protection of their JOs and COS workers.
Forging partnerships with the barangays is one of the many effective and possible ways to bring SSS closer to members, the state insurer said.
It also stressed that it is aggressively pursuing delinquent employers in Bacolod, Negros, and all other regions in the country and will intensify further efforts to collect unremitted contributions.
SSS president and chief executive officer Rolando Ledesma Macasaet assured all members of their commitment to pursue delinquent employers, and urged all employers to comply with their obligations of religiously remitting the social security contributions of their employees.
“Each employer is assigned to a specific SSS account officer, whose responsibility is to ensure employers’ compliance to Republic Act 11199, or the Social Security Act of 2018, such as registration and reporting of their employees and remittance of corresponding contributions to SSS,” Macasaet said in a statement.
Errant employers will receive a demand letter from SSS which could lead to the filing of a case, assuming the persistent non-compliance by the employer, he added.
Macasaet also assured stakeholders that SSS is financially capable of continuously paying benefits and granting loans to members and pensioners since its cash flows remain healthy, with revenues outpacing expenditures./CGC
