Senator joins DTI price monitoring, quality inspection

MANILA, Philippines — As chairman of the committee on trade, commerce and entrepreneurship, Sen. Mark Villar joined one of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI)’s regular price monitoring activities.

“Today we joined the DTI in their price and quality monitoring activity to see if products are following Philippine Standards or PS Quality for locally made products and Import Commodity Clearance or ICC,” Villar said mostly in Filipino.

He joined Assistant Secretary Jean Pacheco, officer-in- charge of DTI’s Consumer Protection Group, and Neil Catajay, director of Bureau of Philippine Standards (BPS, also under DTI), in inspecting the prices of construction materials, furniture and fixtures. Some of the products they inspected are light fixtures, tiles, plywood and appliances.

“It is heartening to note that our merchants and retailers are compliant with standards of BPS. Aside from price monitoring and quality checking, we also tried the QR code attached to the price tag of products that proves compliance to standards,” Villar said.

Once scanned through the app these QR Codes will reveal technical details of the product, including but not limited to brand name, reference standard and PS mark with license number (if applicable). Villar also inspected whether the products have the PS or ICC sticker as part of BPS’ compliance requirements.

“Now that we’re nearing the holiday season, we have to be consistent in monitoring prices of merchandise. Apart from home improvement equipment and fixtures, it is also important to monitor prices of food and flowers to ensure these are fair to consumers,” he added.

Villar, together with Pacheco, called for the public’s help in reporting any merchant or vendor that is non-compliant with DTI’s SRP and quality standards.

For complaints, the public can report to DTI Hotline 1384 or to any social media account of the agency.