LOCAL DATABASES OF SENIOR CITIZENS
LOCAL DATABASES OF SENIOR CITIZENS
Dear Mr. President: If I may ask, how can the barangay
councils effectively provide services to their senior residents if they do not
know who they are and where they live? How can these councils make it easy for
these seniors to do business with their councils? And how could the seniors
avail of local service providers, specially those who are honoring the laws granting
senior citizen discounts? These are good questions to ask, and I believe that I
have the answers to them.
Together with
my technology partners, I am now developing a website application that has six
functions at the barangay level, namely (1) To serve as a local database of
senior citizens, (2) To serve as a directory of senior oriented products and
services, (3) To serve as a marketplace for these products and services, (4) To
serve as a load wallet that could receive cash assistance from Local Government
Units (LGUs), (5) To serve as a communications device so that senior citizens
could easily contact their LGUs and (6) To serve as a backup senior citizen ID
card.
For the convenience
of all senior citizens, the website application could also function as a mobile
application, because it is designed to be mobile-friendly, meaning that it will
work in any mobile phone, using any browser. And of course, it will work
anywhere if there is an available internet connection such as WIFI or mobile
data. Strictly speaking, the mobile app could already function by itself as an
ID card using QR codes, but if they want the senior citizen members could still
avail themselves of a plastic ID card for their convenience if they want it.
Since it
already has a built-in load wallet, either the plastic ID card or the electronic
ID card could also function like a cash card, a debit card or a remittance
card, depending on the preferences of senior citizen members. For good measure,
the product will be fully compliant with all the requirements of the Central
Bank, the National Privacy Commission and the DTI.
As far as I know,
there are still many gaps in the distribution of benefits and assistance from
the LGUs to the senior citizens in their jurisdictions. I am a witness to that,
because I have not received anything from my LGU ever since I became a senior
citizen. As usual, the LGUs would want the senior citizens to personally apply
for the benefits every time it is being offered, but that is very inconvenient for
senior people, they should automate that so that they could immediately get
what they deserve, as easily as possible.
Mr. President, the present system
of using printed senior ID cards and paper booklets is also obsolete, and it
needs to be automated also. As I see it, it is making the flow of customers
slower in the checkout counters, and it is very tiring for senior citizens to
wait longer. It is probably costing the merchants too in the form of having to
hire more workers. IKE SENERES/09-16-2024
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