The Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR) is adjusting salaries for its employees under a new system and following a lengthy delay.
Following years of waiting, PAGCOR employees can look forward to seeing their salaries aligned with other Government Owned and Controlled Corporations (GOCC) after the commission overseeing GOCCs, the GCG, decided to OK the implementation of the gaming regulator’s new Compensation and Position Classification System, or CPCS.
According to PAGCOR Chairman and CEO Alejandro H. Tengco, the commission committed to issue a required authority to implement for the new CPCS during a meeting with the compliance and HR departments of his organization.
The move was confirmed by GCG Commissioner Attorney Geraldine Berberabe-Martinez who said the authority to implement would likely be issued on January 31st.
The GCG issued a memorandum circular, a method to bring acts of the president relating to internal administration to the attention of government departments and agencies, in 2015 ordering the reorganization, rationalization and personnel planning as a requisite for the approval of any reorganization and increase in employees’ pay in GOCCs.
President Benigno Aquino III later issued an Executive Order adopting the CPCS for all government owned and controlled corporations, but his successor Rodrigo Duterte suspended the CPCS and gave GOCCs the option to either implement a modified salary structure or maintain its current one. PAGCOR chose to do the latter and Duterte later reinstated the compensation scheme together with a new index for occupational services, position titles and job grades.
This took effect in October of 2021 and PAGCOR submitted its application for the new rules in November of the same year. The implementation of the CPCS was delayed when the Duterte administration conducted an inspection of PAGCOR and noticed the entity had created a new e-sabong licensing department, and other things, without first getting authorization.
This led to the introduction of the new pay rules being delayed. Alejandro Tengco took the top job in August of 2022 and, together with PAGCOR Corporate Secretary and Compliance Officer, Attorney Leoncio Joel Barrameda III, pushed for its implementation. Following a year of negotiations, employees of the organization can now finally look forward to the new rules being put into place and salaries being adjusted.
