THE Mandaue City Government, the Pagibig office in Bogo City and two offices of the Land Registration Authority (LRA) failed in the Anti-Red Tape Act Report Card Survey in 2015 due to deficiencies in providing services to the public.

But after they were assisted by the Civil Service Commission (CSC) in correcting the deficiencies, their ratings improved in the second run of the survey, except the LRA office in Tagbilaran City.

CSC officials also named the Land Transportation Office (LTO), Social Security System (SSS), Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), Home Development Mutual Fund (Pagibig) and LRA as the agencies with the most number of complaints from the transacting public throughout the country.

CSC Chairperson Alicia dela Rosa-Bala divulged the results of the 2015 survey covering 65 local government units (LGUs) and government agencies delivering frontline services in Central Visayas alone.

Of the 65 offices, 13 were rated excellent, 43 were good, five were acceptable and four failed.

“I would imagine they failed due to the non-posting of the Citizens Charter, which tells you who should be contacted when availing of a service or the turnaround time for a certain transaction… There must also be a posting of the no noonbreak policy and anti-fixers campaign,” Bala said in a press conference yesterday.

These policies may not have been observed when the enumerators interviewed 30 respondents who transacted with the offices at the time of the survey, she said.

Other requirements specified in the Republic Act 9485 or the “Act to improve efficiency in the delivery of government service by reducing bureaucratic red tape, preventing graft and corruption, and providing penalties therefor” is the provision of a help desk, waiting area, clean and functional toilets and designated lanes for persons with disabilities, senior citizens and pregnant women.

The Arta seeks to reduce red tape and curb corruption that stems from inefficient and unclear frontline service procedures. 

Surveyed

The agencies surveyed include the main and field offices of BIR, SSS, LTO, LRA, Pagibig, Government Service Insurance System, Landbank of the Philippines, Philippine Health Insurance Inc., Philippine Statistics Authority, the Professional Regulations Commission and three LGUs.

Cebu City got a rating of 86.06 (good) while Lapu-Lapu City got 77.73 (acceptable).

After getting technical assistance from the CSC, Mandaue City, which initially got 78.90 (failed), improved it services and got a rating of 84.89 (good) in the second run of the survey.

The Pagibig office in Bogo and the LRA office in Mandaue also improved in the second run of the survey, but the LRA office in Tagbilaran City’s still got a failing mark.

“Even after failing in the survey, we have a service delivery excellenc e program, meaning we tell them what made them fail in the different areas, and we assist them in coming up with their own action plan to improve their services… If after all the assistance they still fail the Arta survey, under the law, the CSC can file a case against the head of the office,” said Bala.

Complaints

She clarified, though, that there are more government agencies that got a good rating than the number of those who failed.

Noting the complaints against government hospitals, the CSC chairperson said they will include public hospitals in the next round of the survey.

Aside from the Arta Report Card Survey, the CSC central office also accepts complaints against government offices through the Contact Center ng Bayan hotlines and other channels, which get an average of 3,000 complaints in a month.

Rather than imposing sanctions on the erring offices, Bala said their focus is to improve the services.

The agencies that got the most number of complaints, she said, are LTO, SSS, LRA, BIR and Pag-ibig, “because this is where most of the transacting public are because of basic services.”