The ongoing salary dispute involving employees of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) continues to take its toll on airport operations, prompting Philippine Airlines (PAL) to issue an advisory to its passengers.
“Please come early in anticipation of long immigration lines,” PAL said in an advisory.
The announcement came in the wake of reports that hundreds of immigration agents have gone on leave and/or resigned after President Rodrigo Duterte vetoed the use of funds collected from airport express lanes for overtime pay in January this year.
“Without a separate substantive law as legal basis, the collected fees from the express lane charges should now be deposited as income to the General Fund,” the President said then.
As a result, the BI has been struggling to pay its 960 contractual workers since December 2016. Regular workers also went back to receiving only their basic pay.
Around 1,600 or 80% of the BI’s regular workforce belong to salary grades 1 to 11, earning P6,000 to P13,000 monthly.
