Employees of the Department of Finance (DOF) along with attached agencies and state-owned companies, like the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and Social Security System (SSS), are told to prepare for a full-return to the workplace.
Amid easing quarantine restrictions and COVID-19 infections, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III has ordered all agencies and institutions under the DOF to prepare their respective plans on transitioning work back to their respective office.
“I think that we should already have a plan for transitioning back into working normally. In other words, back-to-office work,” Dominguez said during a recent executive committee meeting for other attached agencies and state-run corporations under the DOF.
“I'd like everybody to start working on this plan already assuming that we're going to have to live with this virus,” he added.
The Interagency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) has yet to allow the full transition to back-to-office arrangements with Metro Manila now under general community quarantine with Alert Level 3 status.
Despite the current IATF policy, Dominguez said the DOF along with its attached agencies and government owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs) should prepare for full-time office-based work after more than a year of work-from-home amid the pandemic.
Dominguez said that the transition plans must follow strict adherence to health and safety protocols of the IATF.
Moreover, he said the transition plans should include testing protocols for employees and their immediate families, and seminars to educate them on how to return safely to full-time office work.
Other agencies attached to the DOF are Bureaus of Customs, Bureau of Local Government Finance, Bureau of the Treasury, Insurance Commission, among others.
There also are GOCCs under the DOF such as SSS, Government Service Insurance System, Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp., among other.
As more government employees get fully vaccinated, operations should gradually shift to working normally in their respective offices, the finance chief said.
In the DOF, 76.6 percent of its employees have been fully vaccinated as of Oct. 8.