NMIS e-payments start in January

MANILA, Philippines — The National Meat Inspection Service will start an electronic payment system for accredited meat establishments nationwide in a bid to cut red tape in government transactions.

To be implemented by January, clients need not personally come to NMIS offices anymore, both in central and regional offices, to pay any fee for its services and instead transact via bank-to-bank.

“We have to do this not only to improve our services and fasttrack our transactions, but also to get away with corruption. There will no longer be meat inspectors who will collect money from our clients,” NMIS executive director Ernesto Gonzales said on the sidelines of the Meat Safety Consciousness Week yesterday.

“There will be less time spent in paying fees and minimize graft and corruption by limiting the face-to-face transaction between the NMIS and the client. As not to compromise meat safety, we have to improve our system,” he added.

The current process is an everyday collection by meat inspectors among meat establishments, then payments will be deposited to the Land Bank of the Philippines, then to the Bureau of the  Treasury.

The NMIS is already facing problems with the lack of manpower, stalling some of its operations particularly inspections. By next year, NMIS targets to double the current 200 people doing meat inspections.

The system will accept payment for the services rendered by the NMIS such as ante and post mortem fee, licensing fee, laboratory fees, good manufacturing practices (GMP) and hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP) certification fees, and imported meat inspection fee, among others.

The development of the e-payment system is in compliance with the E-Commerce Law which mandates the government to have the capability to do e-commerce and shift to electronic system payment for its transactions.

The e-system, however, will not be able to cover locally-registered establishments as the NMIS has no full control over them as they are under the local government units (LGUs).

“Our challenge is the locally registered meat establishments. That is why we are focusing now on strengthening our relationship with LGUs. I instructed our regional directors to coordinate with mayors and governors,” Gonzales said.