Labor and Employment Secretary Rosalinda Dimapilis-Baldoz said that the Employees’ Compensation Program (ECP) has granted P 528.6M in benefit payments covering 137,259 claims filed by public and private sector workers in the first half of 2012.

ECP is a program of the Employees’ Compensation Commission  administered by  the Social Security System (SSS) for the private sector and the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) for the public sector. It seeks to mitigate income risks associated with work-related sickness or injury resulting to disability or death.

“The State Insurance Fund (SIF) which is managed separately by the SSS and the GSIS, holds the contributions paid by the private sector employers and the government agencies,  finances the ECP’s benefit payments comprising of sickness, medical services, disability, rehabilitation services, funeral and death benefits,” Baldoz added.

The SSS has  granted a total of P 510.56 million worth of benefits for 134,606 claims in the private sector. The death and pension benefit has the highest benefit payment granted for the private sector employees.

Meanwhile, the GSIS granted a total of P 18.07 million worth of benefits for 2,653 claims in the government sector. Disability benefits registered the largest chunk in benefit payments for the government employees.

Citing the report of ECC Executive Director Stella Zipagan-Banawis,  Secretary Baldoz said that the total contributions remitted by the private sector employers to the SSS-managed SIF in the first half of 2012 amounted to P728.92 million  while the government remitted a total of P973.55 million to the GSIS-managed SIF.

As of June 30, 2012, total reserves of the SSS-managed SIF amounted to P28.52 billion while the GSIS-managed SIF has a total unassigned surplus of P9.60 billion.  This will be allotted for  future payment of EC claims.