By Leslie Ann Aquino The labor department is hoping to come out with the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of the Republic Act 11360 or the Service Charge Law in less than 90 days. Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III
(Keith Bacongco / MANILA BULLETIN FILE PHOTO) "We hope to come up with it as soon as possible so our workers in hotels and restaurants can finally receive reasonable incentives from their hard work and quality services,” Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said in a statement. "We have 90 days to craft the IRR but we don’t intend to maximize it," he added. Bello believes the law will keep workers in the hotel and restaurants "motivated" in providing quality services, as well as a chance to give them a simple reward for their hard work. To note, the newly signed law requires restaurants, hotels, and similar establishments to distribute service charges in full to their rank-and-file and supervisory employees. The law amended Article 96 of the Labor Code, which only provides workers with 85 percent of the service charge collection while the remaining 15 percent are for the management. Under the new law, all service charges shall be distributed completely and equally among the covered workers except managerial employees. It also mandates the establishment of a grievance mechanism to resolve any dispute between employees and the management on the distribution of the service charge. Workers can fully receive their equal distribution from the full collected service charges 15 days after the publication of its IRR in a newspaper of general circulation.