Government workers to get mid-year bonus on May 15

MANILA, Philippines - The government is not giving out the mid-year bonus of its personnel ahead of the May 9 elections, apparently to avoid accusations that the incentive is intended to boost the chances of winning of its candidates.

“The payment of the mid-year bonus equivalent to one-month salary is not earlier than May 15,” Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said in a text message yesterday.

He said the funds for the incentive are now with government agencies.

The DBM chief said state corporations and local government units are authorized to charge the funds out of relevant appropriations in their budgets.

He added that under a law recently passed by Congress and signed by President Aquino, bonuses and other incentives totaling up to a maximum of P82,000 are exempt from income tax.

The grant of mid-year and yearend bonuses to government workers is mandated under Executive Order No. 201, which Aquino issued last Feb. 9 to fulfill a promise to upgrade salary rates in the bureaucracy.

He had submitted a draft of the proposed Salary Standardization Law 4 to Congress as the enabling authority for the adjustment, but the legislature failed to pass it.

The fate of the proposed law now rests with Aquino’s successor and the next Congress.

Under the increased salary rates scheme contained in EO 201, government officials and employees holding Salary Grades 1 to 28 will get their mid-year bonus in full, as they are covered by the law exempting incentives of up to P82,000 from taxation.

The lowest-paid state worker, who holds Salary Grade 1, has a basic monthly pay of P9,478, up by P478.

Salary Grade 28, which is the pay level of a bureau director, pays a monthly salary of P80,760, up by P13,076 from the previous rate of P67,684.

The bureaucracy has 33 salary grades.

A majority of government personnel will receive tax-exempt mid-year and year-end bonuses. Most of them are clustered in Salary Grades 11 to 13.

Based on the bureaucracy’s staffing blueprint, holders of Salary Grade 11, including teachers, number 426,575, while those with Salary Grades 12 total P114,966. There are 159,409 holding Salary Grade 13.

There are a total of 700,950 personnel with Salary Grades 11 to 13, or nearly half of the 1.5-million government workforce.

The lowest-paid public school teacher now receives a basic monthly salary of P19,077, up by P528 from the previous P18,549. A Salary Grade 12 holder now gets P20,651. His old salary was P19,940. He thus received an increase of P711.

Salary Grade 12 pays P22,328, up by P892 from the previous P21,436.

In contrast, the salary of a Cabinet member went up by P27,086, from P90,000 to P117,086.

The basic pay of an undersecretary increased by P17,408, from P78,946 to P96,354.