Sectoral Meeting: Guidelines Governing Contract of Service (COS) and Job Order (JO) Workers

State Dining Room, Malacañan Palace
April 24, 2024
President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. extends the deadline for the engagement of Contract of Service (COS) and Job Order (JO) workers in government for another year and discusses ways to improve the conditions for COS and JO workers during a sectoral meeting at the State Dining Room in Malacañan Palace on 24 April 2024.
Convening with key officials from concerned government agencies, the President engages in a discussion about the provisions for the implementation of the Commission on Audit (COA)-Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Circular No. 2, signed 2020 entitled ‘Updated Rules and Regulations Governing COS and JO workers in Government,’ and moves the deadline to 31 December 2025 instead of 31 December 2024.
According to DBM Undersecretary Willford Wong, as of 30 June 2023, a total of 832,812 COS/JO workers are employed in government. This number represents a 22.90% increase from the 642,077 workers in the previous year. Local government units (LGUs) retain the highest number of COS/JO workers, accounting for 69.68% or 580,323, up from 487,149 in the previous year (2022). Meanwhile, the number of COS and JO workers in State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) nearly doubled from 22,937 in 2022 to 44,168 in 2023. Furthermore, the National Government Agencies (NGAs) have recorded a 37.99% increase, with a total of 173,227 number of COS/JO workers employed.
Among the strategies being considered are the conversion of COS/JO items into contractual positions which would provide these workers with government service benefits; manpower augmentation through the creation of additional necessary positions; and ways to enable the COS/JO workers to qualify for permanent government positions, among others. Other initiatives include setting a limitation or a hiring ‘cap’ on the number of COS/JO workers per agency, and the inclusion of the Civil Service Commission (CSC) in the COA-DBM Circular No.2, signed 2020.
Present in the meeting are Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Benjamin Abalos Jr., Civil Service Commission (CSC) Chairperson Karlo Alexei Nograles and Commission on Audit (COA) Chairperson Gamaliel Cordoba, among others.
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