OFFICIALS of a municipality in Leyte are in hot water with the Commission on Audit over a finding that it hired 116 job-order personnel in 2019 but paid more than 100 of them below the daily minimum wage set by the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board.
Aside from unfair labor practice, government auditors said the hiring was excessive as there were only 18 vacancies for plantilla positions in the local government’s payroll.
They said the municipal government should have hired qualified personnel to fill up the 18 available regular positions rather than incur unnecessary expenses.
Joint Circular No. 1 s. 2017 of the COA, the Civil Services Commission, and the Department of Budget and Management states that job-order hiring should only be for seasonal or emergency work positions, including clearing of canals or waterways, additional manpower for deployment during calamities, or for carpentry, plumbing or electrical jobs.
“The personnel complement of the local government of Inopacan disclosed that it has 85 plantilla positions, 67 of which were filled while the remaining 18 were unfilled. To compensate the unfilled positions, the LGU hired 116 workers on job order status,” the audit team said.
Of those hired, 62 were found to have been assigned as administrative staff performing the functions of regular personnel.
“The practice… resulted in JOs performing works of regular personnel, redundancy of functions and incurrence of additional wage expenses which the LGU could have avoided,” auditors said.
However, the JO personnel hired were found to have received wages below the recommended P305 daily minimum pay from January to August 2019 that was increased to P315 per day on August 18, 2019.
“The wages by the LGU and received by the JOs range only from P200 to P300 while very few received P350 daily wage. Non-compliance with the prescribed daily minimum wage rates deprived the JOs of the benefits due them,” the audit team said.
Based on the list attached to the 2019 audit report, there were only three JOs who received P350 per day.
“The excess amount paid over and above the amounts in the contracts shall be disallowed in audit,” the agency warned.
The audit team recommended that the municipal mayor order the human resources officer to reduce the number of JO hires, pay those who are retained the prescribed minimum daily wage, and fill up the vacant plantilla positions in the local government payroll.
