The Migrant Workers Department eyes to reduce the recruitment process for overseas Filipino workers from three months to three weeks in compliance with President Bongbong Marcos’ commitment during his first State of the Nation Address.
DMW spokesperson Tony Nebrida said this can be made possible through the digitization of their system and processes. This will also cover the OFWs’ application forms and contracts, among others.
“On digitization, Secretary ‘Toots’ Ople has been working very closely with the DICT… She is relying on the technical skills and experience of Secretary Uy in providing guidance for our digitization process,” said Nebrida during a public briefing.
Read: DMW vows to pursue digitalization to ease OFW document processing
“Must applicants really be physically present in the agencies to submit requirements? Or can they submit certain requirements by attaching them in an online portal as part of their application process to work overseas? The bulk of the bottleneck is created by the process of application to actual deployment which could last as long as three months. If possible, as we digitize our process, we want to cut such a timeframe to three weeks,” he added.
Nebrida said Ople is now reviewing the requirements for hiring to deployment of OFWs.
“The review is being done to all of the attached agencies, and what we found out is that the verification and accreditation [of documents and other requirements] are being done by multiple government agencies. We want these to be done under one department to shorten the process and avoid agencies doing exactly the same thing,” the official added.
“We want to monitor them OFWs until they are for repatriation, reunification with the family, and reintegration with the society,” Nebrida added.
