THE SOCIAL SECURITY SYSTEM (SSS) will lower the interest rate for calamity loans and streamline the program to allow more members to get financial assistance to cope with the impact of natural disasters.
“Following through on the announcement of His Excellency President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. last May 1, 2025 on the reduction of interest rates for salary and calamity loans, we proposed and obtained approval of the Social Security Commission, headed by our Chairperson Finance Secretary Ralph G. Recto, to reduce interest rates for calamity loans to 7% per annum from the current rate of 10%,” SSS President and Chief Executive Officer Robert Joseph M. De Claro said in a statement on Wednesday. “This follows the reduction of interest rate for salary loans to 8% per annum from the previous 10%, which was implemented last month.”
“With the issuance of the revised CLP (Calamity Loan Program) guidelines, SSS will provide emergency financial relief to mitigate impact of natural disasters to members and help get them toward the path of recovery under liberalized terms and conditions,” Mr. De Claro said.
The SSS is earmarking approximately P20 billion for the CLP this year.
The state pension fund disbursed nearly P10 billion worth of calamity loans to over 560,000 affected members in 2024.
The SSS will issue revised guidelines for the CLP to implement the lower rate, which will apply for members who have good credit scores.
“To further enhance financial assistance to members, the revised guidelines have been liberalized to allow calamity loan renewal after six months provided that the existing CLP is not past due,” it added.
“An important improvement in the revised guidelines is the streamlining of the activation process of the Calamity Loan Program, which will allow activation of the program within seven working days from the calamity event date. Previously, activation of the calamity loan program takes about one month,” Mr. De Claro said.
He added that the state pension fund’s Branch Operations Sector and International Operations Group units will endorse State of Calamity declarations to the SSS Member Loans Department within two calendar days from the date of issuance to expedite the process.
Under the revised CLP guidelines, eligible SSS members can borrow up to P20,000 under the program depending on the average of their monthly salary credits in the last 12 months rounded up to the nearest thousand or the amount applied for, whichever is lower.
To be eligible to take out a calamity loan, a member must have at least 36 monthly contributions, with six of these posted within the last 12 months prior to the month of filing.
“For individually paying members, they must also have at least 6 posted contributions under their current membership type (self-employed, voluntary, or land-based overseas Filipino worker),” SSS added.
The new guidelines also include other eligibility requirements.
Members can apply for calamity loans online through the SSS website by accessing their My.SSS account or through the SSS mobile app.
“Loan proceeds shall be released through active Unified Multi-Purpose ID ATM card or active single account in any PESONet participating bank in the name of the member which must be enrolled in the Disbursement Account Enrollment Module of the member-borrower’s My.SSS account,” it said.
The loan is payable within two years in 24 equal monthly amortizations, which will start on the second month after the month of approval.
Members will also be charged a service fee of 1% of the loanable amount, which will be deducted from the loan’s proceeds.
Late payment of loan amortizations will be slapped with a penalty of 1% per month computed and charged for every day of delay. If the loan remains unpaid after two years, a 10% annual interest and 1% monthly penalty will apply until it is fully paid. — AMCS
