COA orders 20 Pasay City consultants to return overpaid services

The Commission on Audit (COA) has ordered 20 consultants of the Pasay City local government to return the sum of P258,571.79 to the city government for their overpaid services in 2010.

In a decision released to the media on Wednesday, COA affirmed the notice of disallowance it issued on September 8, 2011 due to the failure of Mayor Antonino Calixto and Human Resource Management officer-in-charge Maverick Sevilla to file their appeal within the prescribed period of six months.

"Wherefore, premises considered, the Petition for Review is hereby dismissed for having been filed out of time," the COA decision read.

The COA-National Capital Region had found that the 20 consultants were overpaid for their services. Twelve of the consultants were assigned to the Office of the City Administrator, seven served in the Office of the City Mayor, and one was designated at the Office of the City Treasurer.

These personnel served as community and barangay affairs, peace and order, community affairs, barangay affairs, education affairs, local governance, legal matters, and revenue generation and tax collection consultants.

Calixto and Sevilla filed a petition for review with COA in 2015 asking the agency to reconsider the reimbursement of the payments of their consultants.

However, state auditors said it "lost jurisdiction to entertain" the petition since it took Calixto and Sevilla a total of 234 days to file their appeal.

COA said the petitioners received a notice of disallowance on September 9, 2011 but only appealed the COA-NCR decision on March 2, 2012, or a total elapsed time of 173 days.

It added Calixto and Sevilla received the decision of COA-NCR ordering the return of payments on June 25, 2015 and took them another two months to file a petition for review at the COA main office on August 25, 2015.

COA said Calixto and Sevilla only had 180 days to file an appeal as mandated under Section 48 of Presidential Decree No. 1445 and Section 3, Rule VII of the 2009 Revised Rules of Procedure of COA.

"In the same vein, failure to perfect an appeal within the prescribed period is not a mere technicality but jurisdictional, and failure to perfect an appeal renders the judgment final and executory," the decision read.

COA added the rights of Calixto and Sevilla to appeal its decision was lost when they failed to comply with its requirements by filing it beyond the prescribed period.

"Appeal is not a matter of right but a mere statutory privilege. The party who seeks to exercise the right to appeal must comply with the requirements of the rules, failing in which the right to appeal is lost," it said. —KBK, GMA News