Cebu City targets one day processing of business permits

January 25, 2019 is the deadline of the renewal of business permits in Cebu City./ Photo by Cebu City PIO | CDN File Photo

CEBU CITY, Philippines — The Cebu City government plans to further decrease the processing of business permits for establishments from its usual 30 days to a mere one day processing.

Mayor Edgardo Labella said this would be a way to heed the call of President Rodrigo Duterte to ease processing of permits in local government units (LGUs).

Labella said that this would also be a good way to encourage more investments in the city, which would translate to more development, jobs for the people, and a thriving economy.

Businesses seeking a permit in Cebu City will only need to complete all requirements before processing including Department of Industry (DTI) permit, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) certification, proof of taxes, and barangay clearance.

With all these requirements at hand, a business establishment may get a permit in only one day.

Read more: Labella: Cebu City moving to make permits’ processing faster

City Administrator, Lawyer Floro Casas, Jr., said that they noticed that backlogs in business permit processing were caused by the time-consuming sanitary and fire permits.

“We cannot do anything about it because they take at most 2 months to process,” said Casas.

For this reason, the city opted to forego the two permits before giving the businees permits in order to hasten the processing.

However, businesses will be given 60 days to get permits on sanitation and fire safety or else the city may revoke the business permit.

“The city has the right to revoke their permit,” said Casas.

Labella also said they would be looking into a moving the business processing of the city to a new venue, a financial center.

In this way, the city hall will be decongested from all the public and businesses processing permits and paying for fees./dbs