THE Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) is closely monitoring four other recruitment agencies believed to be engaged in illegal activities in Central Visayas.
This, after DOLE-7, together with the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group (CIDG-7) operatives, successfully entrapped an agency in Lapu-Lapu City for violating laws.
Three personnel of Feljobs Manpower Services on ML Quezon Street, Pusok, Lapu-Lapu City, were arrested in an operation on February 15.
Feljobs, whose license as a private recruitment and placement agency expired in 2014, reportedly continued with its recruitment activities constituting illegal recruitment.
“In October 2016 we started monitoring the activities of Feljobs after we discovered it continued hiring workers. Some of its recruitment advertisements were even published on a local newspaper,” DOLE-7 Director Exequiel Sarcauga said.
Two months later Sarcauga said, the office received a report via e-mail regarding Feljob’s illegal activities, such as exaction of P850 per applicant as payment for an identification card and the pre-employment medical examination.
Roy Buenafe, head of the DOLE’s Mediation Arbitration and Legal Service Unit, that took the lead in closely monitoring the establishment, said after paying, applicants were only told to wait, leaving most of them uncertain whether they would eventually land a job or not.
“The office sent a pseudo applicant to Feljobs Manpower Services. We found out the agency’s recruitment activities were going on. On February 5, 2017, Feljops posted another recruitment advertisement published on an online job web site,” Sarcauga said.
The DOLE on February 8 immediately coordinated with CIDG-7 Director Supt. Royina Marzan Garma.
On February 13 the DOLE, represented by Buenafe and three labor-law compliance officers, was joined by the CIDG-7 operatives for a final briefing on the entrapment.
Three Feljobs personnel—one, a recruitment officer—were arrested during the entrapment after receiving marked money. All documents and arrested personnel are now in custody of CIDG-7 for inquest proceedings.
“On our end, we also conducted a compliance visit to the establishment after the entrapment as part of the DOLE’s visitorial power. We sent Cecil Alicando and Engineers Primo N. Guarin and Rustico Levi. M Custorio to conduct an assessment,” Sarcauga said.
Results of the assessment showed Fit2Job Manning and Staffing Services Corp., a Department Order (DO 18-A) registrant, is at the same time operating under the name of Feljobs Manpower Services.
However, Feljobs is also using its license to operate as a private recruitment and placement authority (prpa) in its operation of business.
“The applicants of Feljobs were made to provide their names and other personal information in a personal data sheet using the letterhead, Feljobs Manpower Services. The same applicants were later on referred to Fit2Job for posting or deployment,” he said.
Fit2Job, Feljobs’s branch office, is in Mandaue City. Under the DOLE’s assessment, Feljobs was found to have engaged itself in canvassing, enlisting, utilizing, hiring and procuring workers and referral, contract servicing, promising and advertising for local employment for profit to more or less than 500 individuals with an expired PRPA license.
Apart from illegal recruitment and illegal exaction of money from applicants, other violations noted included the following, namely, no proof of remittance on SSS, PhilHealth and Pag-IBIG contributions and no payroll, daily-time record and pay slips specifically for the period of January to December 2016.
“We are now currently working on the issuance of a permanent closure order against Feljobs Manpower Services. The office shall also conduct another investigation relative to the establishments which have engaged with Feljobs,” Sarcauga said.