QUEZON CITY, March 9 – The Social Security System (SSS) announced that there will be separate withdrawal dates for the additional P1,000 benefit for pensioners under special cases.
SSS President and Chief Executive Officer Emmanuel F. Dooc said that SSS had to run a special program for about 10 percent of its pensioners who are not regularly receiving their monthly pension as of the approval of the P1,000 additional benefit on January 10 since their pension computation varies depending on the nature of their pension status.
“We had to do system adjustments for these special cases to make sure that everybody will receive the additional benefit either on March 31, May 12 or May 26,” explained Dooc.
Dooc said only about 10 percent or more than 242,000 of the 2.2 million SSS pensioners will receive the P1,000 additional benefit on the said dates.
Among the pensioners who will receive the P1,000 additional benefit on March 31 are those under the Special Pension System which includes death claim with more than 1 payee and one of them is overpaid; payees with withheld share; and those covered by a Bilateral Social Security Agreement between the Philippines and other countries and the Portability Law.
“We want to clarify that for the death benefit with multiple payees, we will not give P1,000 for each of the payees rather, the P1,000 additional benefit will be shared equally among them,” said Dooc.
Likewise, pensioners on suspended status due to non-compliance with the Annual Confirmation of Pensioners but are up for resumption from January to March are scheduled to receive the additional benefit on March 31, provided they have already reported to SSS for the resumption of their monthly pension.
Meanwhile, retiree-pensioners who availed of the advance 18 months retirement pension from August 2015 onwards will receive the P1,000 additional benefit on May 12 to cover the remaining months starting January 2017.
“Around 16,000 retiree pensioners who availed of the advance 18 months retirement pension from August 2015 onwards did not receive the additional benefit last March 3 since they are not yet receiving their regular monthly pension. However, come May 12, they will receive the P1,000 additional benefit paid retroactively from January 2017 onwards,” said Dooc.
Pensioners with settled initial disability, death and retirement (DDR) claims from November 2016 to April 2017 as well as those who filed for adjustment in their pension will be able to withdraw their P1,000 additional benefit from their bank accounts on May 12.
Other types of pensioners scheduled to receive the additional benefit on May 12 are partial disability pensioners with less than 12 months duration paid in lump sum. The additional P1,000 per month benefit will cover the number of months they receive the disability pension starting January 2017.
Pensioners who availed of the three-month advance pension due to typhoon Lawin and Nina last year will be paid their pension differential on May 26.
Only about 13,000 pensioners with unpaid loans will not be able to receive the P1,000 additional benefit to offset any outstanding obligation. They will start receiving their regular pension together with the P1,000 additional benefit as soon as they have fully settled their outstanding loan balance.
“We want to clarify that only SSS pensioners are covered by the additional benefit and do not include Employees’ Compensation (EC) pensioners. Starting April, all pensioners including those under special cases will receive the updated amount of their pension. This means that their regular monthly pension will automatically increase by P1,000,” said Dooc.
For questions and clarifications, pensioners may call the SSS hotline at numbers 920-6446 to 55 or email[email protected]. (SSS)
