THE Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said its online payments tool will start accepting later this year fee payments to the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR).
In a report to the Department of Finance (DoF), the SEC said its their online tool, the Electronic Simplified Processing of Application for Registration of Company (eSPARC) currently only accepts payments of SEC fees.
The expansion of service to cover BIR fees would expand the utility of eSPARC, the SEC said.
SEC Commissioner Javey Paul D. Francisco said during a recent DoF meeting that between Jan. 1 and May 15, the SEC processed 25,685 online business registration applications.
This brings the total number of processed applications to 69,350 since the payment tool was launched in the second quarter of 2021.
SEC Chairman Emilio B. Aquino said that the fastest recorded time for processing an eSPARC application was 1 minute, 14 seconds, while the slowest was 2 hours and 37 minutes.
The One-day Submission and E-registration of Companies (OneSEC) is a subsystem of eSPARC. Because company information is already pre-filed under OneSEC, there is little need for further encoding of information online.
In March last year, eSPARC also launched the Electronic System for Payments to SEC (eSPAYSEC) tool to receive registration and other fees with the SEC online via digital wallets, debit and credit cards, and other cashless payment options.
Other digital measures SEC launched were the Electronic Filing and Submission Tool (eFAST), which allows companies to submit audited financial statements, general information sheets, sworn statement for foundations, and general and special forms for financial statements, among other reporting requirements.
The Philippine Business Hub, an online portal launched on Monday, led by the Department of Information and Communications Technology, also aims to accelerate the process of business registration and fee payments. — Tobias Jared Tomas
