The State pension fund or the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) made the announcement that they will be releasing the pension ahead of schedule in May for its member. As per the agency, this is to help and assist all Philippine government workers as the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) health crisis perseveres and the quarantine procedures remain in place.
The GSIS President and General Manager Rolando Ledesma Macasaet said that GSIS pensioners will be able to receive their fair-share of pensions earlier — they can expect to receive it this month
Our pensioners will receive their pension on May 5, instead of the usual crediting date of every eighth of the month.The early release of pension is one of several proactive measures we are taking to help our pensioners cope with the extended Enhanced Community Quarantine period.”
GSIS early pension release
If you are not in the know, the GSIS releases its monthly pensions electronically through the pensioners’ Unified Multi-Purpose ID (UMID) card or the temporary electronic card (eCard) that was issued by either the Land Bank of the Philippines or the UnionBank of the Philippines.
When they're able to get it, they can be withdrawn from the nearest automated teller machine (ATM). Through the GSIS early pension release, they're kind of protecting the pensioners from all the types of threat of the virus; it also is seen as an assurance of their safety.
In the same interview, Macasaet said that there has been an increase in the number of loans after the agency implemented online processing.
The pension fund chief added that they have allocated a budget of Php 6.1 billion for their 511,000 pensioners.
Maganda 'yung result. So far, ang umutang sa amin, almost 40,000 na at tsaka mahigit na almost P4 billion ang na-release namin sa lahat ng loans at tsaka nagawa namin ito online."
In Translation: It had a good result; so far, all of the members who got a loan from us; they were about 40,000 and we spent almost P4 billion to those loans. We were able to do it online.
To report to the nearest GSIS kiosk or office
To be able to continuously receive their pension under the Annual Pensioners' Information Revalidation or APIR, the GSIS usually requires all old-age and survivorship pensioners to report to the nearest GSIS office or GSIS kiosk during their birth month.
Furthermore to his statement, Macasaet said that the pensioners now only need to send a letter to activate and to make their statuses alive. This also includes a couple of requirements from pensioners.
Now, pensioners only need to send us a letter-request to activate their status and a photo of them either holding a newspaper or standing beside a TV screen showing the current date.”
The good news doesn't stop there. In fact, the GSIS also gave their pensioners some type of moratorium on their loans which will be payable for the months of March, April and May of the year 2020 without any concurring penalty or additional interest.
All loan terms were effectively stretched by three (3) months to somehow help ease the situation that our country is in. Macasaet said that they do hope that this period will bring relief to the members.
We hope that this 90-day grace period will give them some financial relief amid these trying times."
Personal and emergency loan applications
In their final note, the State fund said that the pensioners may now apply for pension and emergency loans online. Furthermore, they can proceed to fill out the application form from the GSIS through this link here and email it together with their photo holding their eCard to the designated email address.
Loan applicants may also inquire on these programs through the following:
- The GSIS Official website at gsis.gov.ph
- GSIS Official Facebook page, @Facebook.com/GSIS.ph;
- By sending an email to [email protected]; or
- By calling the GSIS Contact Center at 8847-4747 (if in Metro Manila); or 1-800-8-847-4747 (for Globe and TM subscribers); or 1-800-10-847-4747 (for Smart, Sun, and Talk ‘N Text subscribers).
What do you think about the GSIS early pension release in May? Can this help the pensioners especially in these dire times of crisis? Or would this just be another scrawny act that might fail to help and assist the Filipino people?
Source: GSIS Facebook page
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