13th-month pay loans to be offered by DOLE to micro-companies
Business loans that will help small enterprises fund their employees’ 13th-month salaries will now be limited only to micro-enterprises, according to the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).
In a briefing last Monday, DOLE Secretary Silvestre Bello III said that the restriction is due to the lack of funds.
Bello added that the micro-companies with “a maximum of 10 workers” who are still struggling financially due to the pandemic are the only ones eligible for the program.
The initial program plan was to provide soft loans to micro and small enterprises through the Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) Small Business Corp. (SB Corp.). However, the approved P200 million (US$3.9 million) budget can only cater to micro-businesses.
The labor secretary further disclosed that they had initially requested a P60-billion (US$1.18 billion) budget for the wage subsidy program which would have covered 60% of employee salaries in small businesses.
