DepEd probes undeducted GSIS loans

MANILA – The Department of Education (DepEd) assured its teaching and nonteaching personnel that the agency is addressing the problem of undeducted Government Service Insurance Service (GSIS) loans from their monthly salaries.

In a statement, DepEd said it already appealed to GSIS to reconsider the payment of their personnel’s outstanding loans, which have accumulated huge interests over the years.

“The Department is further seeking the possibility of requesting GSIS to waive imposing surcharges to enable affected member-borrowers to focus on the payment of the principal and the interest. It is understood that interest on GSIS loans form part of the social fund used to pay the benefits and pension of retired government workers, which include DepEd teaching and non-teaching personnel, and cannot be waived,” DepEd said.

DepEd added that it appealed that the September 30, 2018 deadline be moved to December 31, 2018 for all member-borrowers so they could update and settle their past due accounts.

The agency has also requested the GSIS for condonation of compounded accrued interest on past due loans.

Under DepEd’s Automatic Payroll Deduction System, GSIS contributions and loans are automatically deducted from the member-borrower’s salary every month as part of the priority mandatory financial obligations.

However, to be able to make the automated deduction, DepEd first has to receive the electronic billing statement from GSIS, which did not reflect in the reported cases.

DepEd said it will have a meeting with GSIS to look into the reasons behind the reported cases.