The way I see it, the Bureau of Immigration needs to settle into some sort of compromise if it really wants to proceed with its planned new border system that will cost passengers – Filipinos and foreigners alike – $4 or P240 for a one-way international ticket to or from the Philippines.
A round-trip will cost $8 or P480 per passenger and this fee will be added to one’s airline tickets.
If the BI thinks passengers won’t notice this because it will be incorporated in the ticket, it is mistaken. Most passengers look at each item in the airline ticket – the numerous taxes, fuel surcharge, etc. Every peso counts.
Thus, if the BI really wants to implement the project, it must be reasonable about the fee and transparent about the whole project.
The so-called Civil Aviation and Immigration Security Services is a major PPP aimed at modernizing the country’s border management infrastructure across 11 international airports, one major international seaport and six mobile border crossing stations.
It is an unsolicited proposal submitted by US-headquartered Securiport LLC through the PPP Center of the Philippines in May 2023.
The Department of Justice, the designated approving body under Republic Act 11966 or the PPP Code, approved the project on Dec. 2, 2025.
With a project cost of P10.7 billion, the proponent Securiport LLC and the BI will charge a user fee of $4 or P240 per one-way passenger.
But I did my own number crunching and here’s what I learned. With a concession period of 20 years and a project cost of P10.7 billion, the proponent only needs P500 million in revenue annually to recover the cost.
A user fee of $0.29 or P17 per one-way passenger (multiplied by 29 million passengers) translates to roughly P500 million a year.
On the other hand, at the current proposed rate of $4, Securiport would rake in P6.6 billion in revenue a year and would recover the P10.7-billion project cost in less than two years.
Yet passengers will pay the user fee of $4 for the contract period of at least 20 years.
This rate of return is excessive. The implementing rules and regulations of the PPP Code require a reasonable rate of return only for single-bid solicited projects. CAISS, on the other hand, is an unsolicited project.
It’s good that the BI wants to improve our border security to prevent the entry of illegal aliens and stop the trafficking of our kababayans anywhere in the world.
But didn’t it already launch a similar program last year?
This is the Advanced Passenger Information System and Passenger Name Record data.
This was done with the help of the United Nations Countering Terrorist Travel Program, which helps countries detect and prevent the movement of terrorists and serious criminals.
Using the system, the BI had already flagged an Interpol-listed passenger nine hours before landing in July 2026.
If this works, what do we need the new system for?
Higher cost for tourists
Besides, an additional $4 per one-way international passenger would certainly affect tourism.
As it is now, we are lagging behind other Southeast Asian countries in tourism. Many foreigners are opting to visit Vietnam instead of traveling to the Philippines. Everyone’s talking about Da Nang, a coastal city in Vietnam, for instance, and how easy it is to go there and how much more affordable to visit compared to the Philippines.
Vietnam has significantly outperformed the Philippines in international tourism arrivals.
Last year, our Southeast Asian neighbor welcomed 21.2 million foreign visitors compared to the Philippines’ roughly 5.9 million.
Higher fees will also hurt OFWs
Immigration Commissioner Joel Viado said last month during a budget hearing at the House of Representatives, that overseas Filipino workers won’t be paying the fee themselves but their employers.
However, immigration experts quoted in news reports say the proposed imposition of border fees would inevitably add to the travel costs of about 1.7 million OFWs who return to the Philippines each year for vacation.
Recruitment consultant Emmanuel Geslani, according to the reports, said that employers usually only cover the travel costs for outgoing travels to their job site.
This means that OFWs intending to fly back to the Philippines would have to shoulder their own border fee.
Who are the proponents?
Another question stakeholders raised is: who is the local partner of Securiport in the Philippines?
Perhaps the local partner can provide more details on the project as well as the parameters regarding the critical and highly sensitive data it would collect from departing and arriving passengers?
Securiport itself, as I said in my column last Tuesday, has had some issues in other countries such as in Gambia where a national audit found out that it had months of unpaid government share.
The BI should provide more details on this if it is determined to push the project forward. And if we need to pay for it, we need to know where our money will go.
Keeping our borders safe is important but it’s not just about implementing a new system or platform.
It’s also making sure that the BI goes after corrupt personnel who are in cahoots with illegal recruiters trafficking our kababayans abroad and fixers bringing illegal aliens inside the country.
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