House panels approve enhanced discounts for seniors, PWDs

MANILA, Philippines — Three House committees yesterday approved three bills that would enhance discounts, incentives and tax exemptions for senior citizens (SC) and persons with disabilities (PWDs).

The bills are proposing “comprehensive and user-friendly guidelines for the local government units and business establishments on the proper administration of SC and PWD benefits,” according to Rep. Joey Salceda, chair of the House committee on ways and means.

The measures also mandate business enterprises to train their staff on granting benefits to these two sectors and to display information about their benefits “conspicuously in business establishments,” he said during a hearing.

Channels for registering as a senior or a PWD should be “simple, straightforward, prominently displayed and immediately visible,” he added.

An “e-Gov PH Super App” would also be designed as an alternative for the application of senior and PWD identification and to access government services, Salceda noted.

Data showed there are some 2.3 million seniors and 670 registered PWDs in the Philippines.

The measures are products of an inquiry conducted in January by three committees in the House of Representatives: the committees on ways and means, senior citizens and persons with disabilities.

They were deliberating on gaps in the implementation of the Senior Citizens Act and Magna Carta for PWDs after coffee chain Starbucks received flak for capping the 20 percent discount that seniors and PWDs are legally entitled to, limiting it to only “one food item and one beverage.”

Meanwhile, the proposed P500 monthly discount on groceries will significantly help seniors and PWDs amid rising inflation, according to the National Commission of Senior Citizens (NCSC).

“This will be very meaningful for the senior citizens,” NCSC chair Franklin Quijano said yesterday during the Bagong Pilipinas Ngayon public briefing aired on state-run PTV.

The increase is a significant improvement in benefits that the Filipino elderly and PWDs are legally entitled to as inflation jumped to 3.4 percent in February, Quijano stressed.

He called on seniors and PWDs to report establishments that would not implement the increased discount to the NCSC and local government units’ Office for Senior Citizens Affairs.

Speaker Martin Romualdez earlier sought a hike in the five percent grocery discount that seniors and PWDs enjoy weekly, currently capped at a total purchase value of P1,300 or a P65 weekly discount.

Romualdez recommended the maximum discountable amount be increased to P2,500 or a P125 weekly discount.

The increase is expected to be implemented before the end of the month. — Helen Flores