By Charissa Luci-Atienza Over 17 million low-income families have received their Social Amelioration Program (SAP) cash subsidies amounting to more than P96.59 billion, the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DWSD) said on Saturday, May 16. Department of Social Welfare and Development (MANILA BULLETIN) DSWD Spokesperson Irene Dumlao said the agency is closely coordinating with local government units (LGUs) to ensure the immediate and complete distribution of the first tranche of emergency subsidies to all 18 million low-income families. "Sa pangkalahatan, nakapagpahatid na ang DSWD ng mahigit P96.59 billion sa mahigit na 17 million na beneficiaries ng SAP (Overall, the DSWD has extended more than P96.59 billion to over 17 million beneficiaries)," she said during the "Laging Handa" briefing on Saturday. Of the total number of SAP beneficiaries, 12.8 million are non-4Ps families, receiving more than P78 billion worth of subsidies. "Sa kasalukuyan, patuloy pa rin po ang ginagawang coordination at monitoring ng Departmento sa mga local pamahalaan na sa kasalukuyan ay nagpapatuloy yung kanilang sinasagawang payouts (At present, the DSWD has been in coordination and monitoring the LGUs that have ongoing payouts)," Dumlao said. In a Viber message to the Manila Bulletin, 1,157 or 70.8 percent of the 1,634 LGUs in the country completed the SAP distribution, while 215 LGUs have submitted their liquidation reports. During the briefing, Dumlao disclosed that the pilot test run of ReliefAgad mobile application for faster distribution of the SAP second tranche is ongoing in the National Capital Region (NCR). "We would like to remind our beneficiaries na sa kasalukuyan ay ipilot run po muna natin ang aplikasyon ng ReliefAgad sa mga beneficiaries under the National Capital Region," she said. (We would like to remind our beneficiaries that currently, the ReliefAgad application is under pilot test run for the beneficiaries under the NCR.) "At magkakaron ng anunsiyo ang Department para naman po sa ibang lugar kung magiging epektibo na po ang ReliefAgad application sa kanilang mga lugar," she added. (The Department will make an announcement to other areas once the ReliefAgad application will be launched in their respective areas.) On May 14, Thursday, the DSWD, in partnership with the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), and Developers Connect Philippines virtually launched the "ReliefAgad" mobile application where the SAP beneficiaries can register and send their details to their local government units (LGUs) and DSWD. Dumlao encouraged the beneficiaries with Social Amelioration Card (SAC) forms to visit www.reliefagad.ph and scan the unique barcode which is printed on the lower right corner of the SAC forms. The DSWD said under the application, there is an option to manually encode the SAC number by the LGUs. Under the ReliefAgad system, beneficiaries can receive their SAP subsidy through Pay Maya, GCash, or bank account, whichever they prefer. The DSWD maintained that it is still waiting "for the written directive or Executive Order from the Office of the President which will serve as basis in crafting the implementing guidelines for the second tranche." Under Republic Act No. 11469 or the Bayanihan to Heal as One Act, 18 million low-income households are entitled to receive emergency cash subsidies ranging from P5,000 to 8,000 based on respective regional wage rates for months of April and May.