Prepaid loads will now have an extended one-year expiry from its initial load-up, thanks to a new Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), and National Telecommunications Commission joint memorandum agreement.

Under the said joint memorandum, prepaid loads containing any amount have been extended to one year before it expires. This amendment is to allow prepaid load users to have more time in consuming their loads.

Trade secretary Ramon Lopez said that this step is meant to help small to medium-sized businesses in dealing with daily transactions. “DTI is confident that our Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) will be able to do business more easily thanks to this circular, whether by making calls or sending an SMS to their customers or by accessing the internet to conduct e-commerce,” he said.

NTC’s Memorandum Circular No. 03-07-2009 originally states that the validity of the prepaid load will depend on the amount of the load that was purchased. An example for this is a load that amounts from Php10 to Php50 will only last for fifteen days.

Excluded from the memorandum are the ones that include a specific period of time before it expires or prepaid loads that are included in promotions.

Source: CNN Philippines