The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), through its 2018 Occupational Wages Survey (OWS) and the 2017/2018 Integrated Survey on Labor and Employment (ISLE), reported that 87.3 percent or 28,189 establishments with 20 or more workers are aware of the Employees’ Compensation Program (ECP).

In the survey results presented by PSA, where the ECP was a rider module in the OWS and ISLE, the sector on electricity, gas, steam, and air conditioning supply accounted for the highest ECP awareness at 97.5 percent among all sectors. Manufacturing and financial and insurance activities both recorded 90.3 percent in ECP awareness, coming second and third respectively among all sectors.

In addition, PSA survey results showed that much of the awareness on the Employees’ Compensation Program is derived from the Social Security System (SSS) website (46.5 percent), SSS lectures and seminars (40.9 percent), and through the company and co-workers (28.3 percent). Medical benefits, disability benefits, and death benefits ranked as the most common types of information people learn about ECP which are often disseminated through echo-seminars in coordination with SSS and initiated by the establishments and through flyers and posters.

“The data presented by the Philippine Statistics Authority through OWS and ISLE are crucial to the decision-making process of ECC on the formulation of policies and programs to improve the ECP and the modes of information dissemination for ECP awareness,” Executive Director Stella Zipagan-Banawis said.

OWS and ISLE are simultaneous surveys conducted by PSA once in two years to collect information on the basic pay and allowances of time-rated workers on full-time basis and key information on labor and employment, respectively.

Through its awareness campaigns and continuous efforts in information dissemination, ECC hopes to inform more Filipino workers of their benefits and help more people with work-related disabilities (PWRDs) and their families to start over and have decent lives.

“We continue to work towards strengthening our campaigns and advocacy to ensure that all Filipino workers will know their benefits under the Employees’ Compensation Program and avail ECC’s services in the event of work-related contingency,” Banawis said.