SEC to set up satellite offices in SM shopping malls

The Securities and Exchange Commission is putting up satellite offices in SM malls in a bid to provide convenience and service to more business and corporate entities.

SEC Chair Teresita Herbosa and SM Supermalls president Annie Garcia led the signing of a memorandum of agreement for the establishment of an SEC satellite office in SM City Manila, which is scheduled to open at the end of April.

Herbosa said the SEC satellite office would offer frontline services of the commission, including filing of the general information sheets, audited financial statements, articles of incorporation and any amendments to it.

The AOI and the amended AOI may be processed within 24 hours, she said.

Herbosa said the SEC’s decision to open a satellite office stemmed from the success enjoyed by other government offices that had set up satellite offices in the malls.

“We saw the experience of some SM Malls and the other agencies such as Philippine Health Insurance (Philhealth), the Social Security System, the Bayad Centers, the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Land Transportation Office. And when we saw these doing very well, I said our frontline services are no different from the others and I think it is high time that we set up satellite offices,” she said.

Herbosa also said the limited number extension offices of the SEC in various parts of the country had been a source of difficulties for many companies because they had to travel far just to file their annual requirements to the SEC.

“We already have extension offices in major cities only but other areas are not covered. Can you imagine the traffic that you have to go through to go to [our main office in] Edsa Mandaluyong and our building is not that new anymore, you cannot have so many people there. The satellite offices is the answer,” she said.

She said SEC had chosen SM as its satellite office in Manila because of its strategic location to many of the businesses in the area.

“The Manila mall is strategic because you have the Binondo business area. The schools and the University area and all the way to the Roxas Boulevard area will be using facilities in SM Manila,” she said.

SEC, she added, is also set to open another satellite office in SM North Edsa in Quezon City and negotiations are now underway for the first satellite provincial office preferably in Cagayan Valley through SM City Cauayan in Isabela.

“I hope that we could finalize everything within the year and hopefully this will be the start of a strong and long partnership with SM so that the time will come when the SEC is present in all SM malls,” Herbosa said.

Just like the other government offices, SEC will be using the mall space in SM for free. “The arrangement is the same with other government offices but we will pay for our utilities and of course the equipment will be ours,” she said.

Garcia, for her part, said SM is honored to be a partner of SEC in the performance of its mandate to serve businesses and organizations in the country. “We have always been supportive of businesses. They are our partners and we want to make sure that we give them all the opportunities to succeed. This is just one way of expressing that support,” Garcia said.