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GSIS Team to accept enrollments for new e-Card Plus on March 9 to 10 and March 12 to 13 at the Consulate

PHILIPPINE CONSULATE - NEWS RELEASE
21 February 2007

NEW YORK --- A team from the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) will be in New York on March 9 to 10 and March 12 to 13, from 9 AM to 4 PM, to accept enrollments for the new GSIS e-Card Plus. This was announced by the GSIS through the Philippine Consulate General in New York. The enrollment will be held at the Philippine Consulate General office located at 556 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY.

Enrollment for the e-Card Plus is open to all GSIS pensioners regardless of where they reside in the United States or anywhere in the world for as long as they can present two valid IDs (e.g., an unexpired US Government-issued ID with photo like a driver’s license or US passport, or an unexpired Philippine passport) during the enrollment process.

e-Card Plus is the new ID card that GSIS issues to its members and pensioners to enable them to continue receiving their pension and/or remotely transact business with the GSIS. The card will also enable pensioners to comply with the annual verification requirement by the GSIS without the need of personally appearing before the nearest GSIS servicing office. Aside from serving as an ID Card, eCard Plus can function as an ATM card (meaning, pensioners can use it to withdraw their monthly pension in U.S. dollars from any Visa Plus Network ATM machine in the United States) and debit card. The new card is free of charge.

Enrollment for, and issuance of, the eCard Plus has been made possible by a technology called G-W@PS. According to GSIS President and General Manager Winston F. Garcia, “G-W@PS (which comes in the form of a kiosk) is an automation system that replicates common GSIS frontline transactions. It makes use of world-class technologies such as radio frequency identification (RFID), biometrics and virtual private network (VPN), to come up with a secure system that can process transactions available for pensioners, off-site and in a completely paperless manner.” Mr. Garcia proudly announced that GSIS’s G-W@PS “is a world first in e-Governance technology.”

GSIS explained how the G-W@PS works, as follows:

“The RFID reader in the G-W@PS allows it to read the pensioner’s profile stored in the eCard Plus’s RFID chip. The biometric scanner, on the other hand, identifies the biometric information of the pensioner through his fingerprints, which was also stored in the RFID chip of the eCard Plus. Thus, the G-W@PS matches the biometric information embedded in the eCard Plus and the fingerprint that has been scanned. This will ensure that only the pensioner can use his own eCard Plus to transact with the kiosk.

“Through the VPN technology, meanwhile, the kiosk sends the data back to the GSIS office in the Philippines for confirmation and approval.

“The GW@PS can help pensioners comply with the GSIS’ annual reporting requirement, without the need for them to go to their respective servicing GSIS offices.

“Using their eCard Plus, the pensioner only needs to go to any G-W@PS kiosk on their birth month, select the online verification system on the menu, and place their finger in its biometric reader. In real time, the GSIS recognizes that the pensioner is still alive, preventing disruption in his pension.”

To date, there are 2,787 old-age pensioners and 672 survivorship pensioners in the United States or a total of 3,459 pensioners.

For more information on the enrollment for the e-Card Plus, please call the Philippine Consulate General at (212) 764-1330 and ask for Mr. Elmer Abu at extension 320 or 321, or Mr. Jose Morales at extension 624.