Starting tomorrow PDIC to give claim forms to selected Legacy clients

CEBU, Philippines – The Philippine Deposit Insurance Corporation will start releasing claim forms tomorrow to “selected depositors” of the rural banks under the Legacy Group that have closed.

Ferdinand Beluan, PDIC department manager III for Receivership and Liquidation, told The FREEMAN yesterday that only depositors with a single deposit under regular savings and which does not exceed P100,000 will be given the forms.

Beluan said that only those “selected depositors” called as batch one can get their money back starting this Friday.

Beluan however explained that for all other depositors, especially those who have more than P100,000 deposits, an announcement will just be made either at the end of this month or in the first week of March.

Beluan said that the selected depositors can get their money from the branch where their money was deposited.

The Legacy Group of Banks that has declared bank holidays last December has an estimated 90,000 depositors.

It maybe recalled that the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas put the 13 banks of the Legacy Group under receivership since December 8, 2008.

The Legacy Group of Banks have been found by the BSP examiners in July 2007 to have an aggregate undercapitalization of P2.5billion.

BSP then ordered the said banks to be put under receivership, but the bank management filed a case. The Supreme Court ruled last November 24 favoring BSP.

Of the 13 banks, five are in Cebu — the Philippine Countryside Rural Bank and all its branches, the Pilipino Rural Bank and all its branches, the Rural Bank of Bais (Supreme Bank) in Mandaue City, the Bank of East Asia in Minglanilla and the last the Rural Bank of Carmen in Carmen, Cebu. — Mitchelle L. Palaubsanon/NLQ (THE FREEMAN)