AS MOST Cebu City residents reel financially due to business disruptions caused by the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic, Mayor Edgardo Labella has urged telecommunication companies, banks and other commercial establishments to postpone the monthly collection of bills from their customers.
The local executive will meet the firms’ representatives on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, and he will persuade them to heed his plan as he had received reports about his constituents’ financial woes caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Some workers, such as those employed by hotels and resorts, have been forced to go on leave by their superiors without pay for lack of customers.
Representatives from the Metropolitan Cebu Water District, Visayan Electric, public utility vehicle operators and the Home Development Mutual Fund (commonly known as the Pag-IBIG Fund) are expected to be present in the meeting Wednesday.
Labella wants the due dates to be pushed to later dates.
The mayor said his constituents were worried that the services like the water and Internet would be disrupted if they failed to pay their dues, and they feared that they could not pay their bills if the Covid-19 pandemic would not decline soon.
Meanwhile, Councilor Raymond Alvin Garcia, Cebu City Council majority floor leader, said the council plans to pass an ordinance giving firms a 50 percent discount on business taxes for the months of March and April as a way of giving back if they show kindness to their customers.
Garcia, who also chairs the committee on laws, said the City Council may also pass an ordinance giving business tax discounts to mall tenants. (PAC / JKV)