Postponed Field Work

This morning, I was all set and ready to travel again and conduct field verifications (Fact-of-death/birth/marriage or FOD/FOB/FOB) to some of the places under our functional area of responsibility particularly to the towns of Las Navas, Catubig, Laoang and Pambujan. However, the weather wasn't that cooperative, so after almost an hour at the Jeepney Terminal waiting for the rain to stop pouring, I decided to return to the office and scheduled the job to some other date.

I just can't imagine how'll I look like upon return to office if I decided to proceed notwithstanding the kind of weather we have now...haha..

Catarman (courtesy of Arnel De Silva Photography)


On the way I have to go through this...

to Las Navas

... and this...

to Kalingnan, Catubig

... and this one too...

to Laoang

... and also this.

Laoang

Sadly, I lost courage to take, once again, the risk of going to these places just to fulfill my duties. Anyway, maybe tomorrow, when the weather would be fine, I could now go on and do the pending workload.

i work here...

Yes. This skimpy little space is our office... i've been coming here since 2004 (including some 4 years from our previous office)... small, bare, but it's fine with us, anyway we're only two working on here..

This is how it looks inside...

 ... with some valued clients...

I sit here...

At least, we have one PC (offline, though)

... and this is my partner, Ma'am Elma.

We single-handedly handle all transactions in the office. We depend on no one but us. She manages the counter, while I do the other dirty works: field transactions and some admin jobs.



Our area covers almost the whole of the province of Northern Samar, consisting of two Congressional Districts, covering 24 municipalities and with a population of over 500,000. The province is fully deserving of at least one full-service SSS branch--a development we have been dreaming of since the time the office had been established sometime in 1995.

We're here. We cover these areas.

In 2003, when the System finally ordered our immediate evacuation from being stalled at the hallway at Catarman Municipal Hall and allowed us to rent an office space we can call our own, we all thought that we were near to realizing that dream. Unfortunately, nothing has really changed and the dream remains elusive.

First timers to the office could not help but sigh on the kind of technical service the System offers through us. Why not? We only have TWO versatile generalist-counter personnel rendering excellent customer service in an OFFLINE COUNTER, aside from that, we offer no more. Our hands are tied, and that's all that we can give our clients: humane, prompt, sensitive, compassionate and TLC personal service. We receive clients even at home, at transport terminals, markets, restaurants, and even during funerals, and we're always ready to answer every questions being thrown at us about the System.

Among the government's social security agencies, the SSS was the first to set foot in Catarman, however, it remained a representative office since then, continued to be attached to Calbayog Branch, and watched other GFIs spring fully into place. Philhealth opened its full-service branch in 2002, GSIS follow suit in 2005, and currently PAG-IBIG Fund is scouting for an office for a possible opening within the year.

Why is this so?

I understand, the System's top managers are very much careful with respect to introducing changes in branch operations, and the people should also try to understand that. We know that there are a lot of factors that should be considered before drawing on a much bigger canvass, that there are a lot of minor issues that needs to be resolved before a bigger issue should be faced. People, however, do not seem to know this.

People do not quite understand "financial viability" as one of the very reasons why SSS offices do not just sprout and grow, because they do not even know the term. Honestly, if we would just let the people rate us in terms of TECHNICAL service, we would be lost in the charts. In terms of human relations, however, we could very much top the list, and we are very sure with that, because that's the only thing that we could offer our members, for now, i.e., excellent customer service.

People do not yet know that we're collecting more than 2Million Pesos every month on premium contributions (which have quadrupled from a little over 500K in 2004), and we're spending a little less than than P20,000 on operational expenses (excluding, of course, payment of personal services such as salaries and allowances of employees). People do not also know that we are allowed by the SSS Law to spend a 12% part of that collection, which in absolute terms could round off to P250,000.

People do not yet know that as of the current set-up, SSS Catarman is very much viable. For now, they will have to bear with us a little more, and if they demand ONLINE service, we would be always be willing to refer them to Calbayog Branch--the next full-service branch located some 120 kilometers away from Catarman.

We're grateful we are being helped by this dynamic support group from our mother branch Calbayog.