Beginning Oct. 27, overseas Filipino workers can access their OECs and other documents digitally, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) announced on Thursday.

“The OECs of the workers will now be downloaded on their mobile device. We were set to launch on October 15. But we decided to move it back to October 27,” DMW Secretary Susan Ople said during the DMW presentation at the Joint Maritime Committees of European Business Chambers.

Ople explained, they delayed the launch of the initiative, which is in partnership with the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), to further test the digital portal.

“We pushed it back a bit just to ensure that once we roll it out, the glitches will really just be the bare minimum,” she reasoned.
According to Ople, the digitalization will slash the processing time of the documents of OFWs as well as simplify it.

“The experience of a ship owner for example, in Germany will be the same as a ship owner in Japan, and a worker in Hong Kong will experience, will have the same experience as a nurse in the US,” she said.

Ople went on, “So with this app, the worker can store the passport image and then there will be the OEC in a QR format. So that the Bureau of Immigration only can look at that.”

Ople added that OFWs can also store other personnel files in the application.

A help desk that will answer inquiries from workers will also be available on the app.

“That’s just a prototype of the OFW mobile app. It's still evolving. We have daily meetings now in preparation for the launch,” Ople assured.