Members of the Social Security System (SSS) who cannot work due to sickness or injury, including those who contracted the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) can avail of their sickness benefits.
In a statement, Aurora C. Ignacio, SSS president and chief executive officer said that the sickness benefit is a daily cash allowance paid for the number of days that a member cannot work due to sickness or injury.
Ignacio disclosed that SSS already released around P3.30 billion to 399,455 members who availed of the benefit from January to November last year.
Under the program, a member will qualify once he was confined either in a hospital or at home for at least four days, has used up all his current company sick leaves for the current year and has notified his employer regarding his sickness or injury.
However, a member must have paid at least three monthly contributions within the last 12 months prior to the semester of sickness or injury to avail of the sickness benefit.
“We are aware that many of our members are getting sick right now. Some of them even got infected by the current Omicron variant. We want to assure them that SSS is providing them with sickness benefit to augment their lost income,” Ignacio said.
Employed, self-employed, voluntary, and overseas Filipino worker (OFW) members could avail of the sickness benefit which is granted up to a maximum of 120 days in one calendar year to qualified members.
For those members who contracted COVID-19, they must provide a positive Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) test, Ignacio said.
The daily cash allowance is equivalent to 90 percent of the member’s average daily salary credit (ADSC).
For self-employed, voluntary, and OFW members, they can submit their Sickness Benefit Application Forms for their home confinement to SSS within 60 calendar days after the lifting of the community quarantine.
Effective July 2020, employers may file their Sickness Benefit Reimbursement Applications (SBRAs) using their My.SSS accounts.
Approved sickness benefit of members will be paid through their Unified Multi-purpose Identification (UMID) card enrolled as an ATM card or through their disbursement accounts in participating banks.
For employers, proceeds of the sickness reimbursements shall be credited to their enrolled disbursement bank account enrolled in DAEM.
“We want to remind the employers that under Republic Act 11199 or the Social Security Act of 2018, they should pay in advance the approved sickness benefit of their employees which is one of their primary obligations,” Ignacio concluded.