‘GSIS trustees don’t deserve bonuses’

MANILA, Philippines - Members of the board of trustees of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) do not deserve their bonuses, a party-list group representing public school teachers said yesterday.

Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) said the present GSIS management team has performed poorly like its predecessors.

“The same problems during the past GSIS administration are still there. Our service records are still not updated, their system still cannot reflect the exact amount of contributions each member has paid,” it said.

“In fact, the reconciliation of records between the Department of Education and GSIS is not progressing at all. Is this a job well done?” ACT said.

The group added that retiring government personnel who want their records and contributions reconciled are just being given the runaround.

They pointed out that this problem has been pestering GSIS members, particularly retirees, for decades apparently without any solution in sight.

Public school teachers, more than 500,000 of them, are the single largest group of GSIS members.

GSIS trustees have received a bonus of more than P1 million each supposedly for good performance. General manager Robert Vergara took home a total of P16.3 million, including his P1.6 performance incentive.

ACT chided Vergara and asked him if he thinks he really deserved that amount.

“We are disgusted and enraged to learn that Mr. Vergara’s salary increased by almost 100 percent last year to P16.26 million from P8.3 million in 2011. We are the members and considered to be the owner of that financial institution, but received no improvement in services and benefits,” it said.

“Seeing the same problems in services, do you really think that you performed well?” the group asked.

The same criticisms have been leveled against trustees of the Social Security System (SSS), who, like their GSIS counterparts, received hefty performance bonuses.

SSS members also complained of poor service from their pension fund even in simple things like issuance of identification cards.

In a statement, the GSIS debunked ACT’s pronouncements saying the grant of bonus underwent a process of review by the Governance Commission for GOCCs “using specific metrics,” including the state pension fund’s having successfully met its target for 2012.

The GSIS said 2012 was a “banner year” as its income reached P93.2 billion from P73.2 billion in 2011 and P63.9 billion in 2010.

In its statement, the GSIS also reported processing a total of 136,214 in social insurance claims which include retirement/separation benefit, disability benefit, life insurance, funeral and survivorship benefits amounting to P31.3 billion.

In addition, the number of claims and benefits processed under other GSIS-administered funds such as optional life insurance, pre-need and employees’ compensation reached 69,156 or P1.3 billion. The pension fund also reported processing a total of 2,139,385 in various loans worth P111.7 billion. Pensioners paid reached 351,268 with the amount involved at P31.6 billion.