COA denies trade school of P28-million claim due to lack of paperwork

MANILA, Philippines – The Commission on Audit (COA) denied a trade school’s P28-million payment claims from the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) for failing to provide specific documents to back their request.

Asiantouch International Training Institute’s claim included P20.07 million that covered training costs and another P3.74-million worth of assessment fees.

“The documents submitted cannot account for the full amount being claimed by Asiantouch,” the 12-page COA decision read.

“There was no proper accounting as to how much was the actual cost of services rendered by Asiantouch under the contract per Region, and how much has been paid.”

According to a 2009 deal, TESDA was supposed to provide a scholarship vouchers to Asiantouch’s branches across Quezon City, Manila, Pasig City, Muntinlupa City, Silang in Cavite, Sta. Rosa in Laguna, Batangas, Montalban in Rizal, Minalin in Pampanga, San Jose del Monte City in Bulacan, San Pedro in Iloilo City, and Balanga in Bataan as part of the Training for Work Scholarship Program of the Arroyo administration.

The Pangulong Gloria Scholarship (PGS) vouchers were valid for only two months.

However, Asiantouch said it had to pay for the Training Support Fund (TSF) because there were times that TESDA failed to send them their stipend.

Asiantouch filed their petition with the COA on July 6, 2020. The trade school said they did not get a response from TESDA even after they sent several letters regarding their claims.

Months later, on September 8, 2020, Isidro Lapeña, who was then the secretary of TESDA, said Asiantouch’s claims could not be validated because they lacked the needed documents to prove that they did pay for TSF to cover for the PGS vouchers. He also said some documents submitted by Asiantouch, such as the Registry of Workers Assessed and Certified, did not have signatures of their trainees.

The trade school itself admitted that it can no longer validate some of the documents it submitted since the officials responsible are no longer with the school, moved overseas, or have already died. – Rappler.com