By Daisy CL Mandap
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| Registering with the One Health Pass is a must for all travelers to the Philippines |
“One Health Pass is free!” This was emphasized by Consul Paul Saret during a Facebook Live interview with The SUN on Wednesday, June 1, saying the Consulate had received reports that some travelers bound for the Philippines were being charged a fee to obtain the QR code needed to gain entry to the country.
His advice came just in time to save Nita, a Manila-bound
overseas Filipino worker from paying USD75 through a site that first popped up
when she searched for “One Health Pass” on google.
Luckily, after registering with the platform, Nita was
stumped when she was told in an email that she needed to pay by credit card
before she could get the QR code that she needed to board her flight.
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| PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE |
The email read, “Additional steps are required to
finalize your Philippines One Health Pass application. The final review and the
payment only takes a moment to complete.”
The next page had the payment instruction, along with
the reminder that the standard processing time for her application is between
one to two business days.
The reminder made the Filipina panic even more as she
was due to fly home tomorrow, June 5, and there was hardly a day left for her
to register with the health declaration platform and obtain the all-important
QR code so she could board her flight.
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But after being repeatedly told by The SUN that the
registration and the entry pass should be free, she finally managed to find the
correct website and get the QR code without paying anything.
Consul Saret said the correct website is https://www.onehealthpass.com.ph.
The online platform is directly linked to the Bureau of Quarantine website so it
guarantees privacy to travelers registering their personal information,
including their vaccination status and medical condition.
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| This is what appears on the official government website: www.onehealthpass.com.ph |
He said the online form replaced the paper health
declaration that used to be given to arriving passengers which they could
complete at leisure on board the aircraft, or just before going through
immigration at Philippine airports.
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Registering their own details online saved health
authorities in the Philippines the trouble of ensuring the information supplied
by the travelers were accurate, as well as the time needed to encode all the
written declarations from thousands of people who arrive in the country each
day.
To safely ensure that they get to complete the registration
process well ahead of their boarding time, Saret said travelers should log on
and fill out the form at the earliest opportunity.
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| BAN ON FLIGHTS FROM THE PHILIPPINES LIFTED ON APRIL 1. BOOK YOUR FLIGHTS NOW! PRESS FOR DETAILS |
He said all travelers are given up to 72 hours or
three days to register and obtain the QR code and print it for presentation at
the boarding gates, so they should have enough time to complete the process.
Meanwhile, they should avoid going through any
websites other than the official one so they are not charged any fee for doing
what they could easily do on their own.
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| Nida was told to pay US$75 via credit card to get the QR code |
In Nita’s case, the website she entered was www.ph-entranceform.com,
which purports to be a “professional travel agency that aims to help
individuals and companies complete the necessary document requests for
short-term stays.”
It does say that it charges a fee, but adds erroneously
that an application can also be submitted “for a lower cost” through the
government’s website, and even adds a link to the site.
Curiously, the site asks for exactly the same
information that the government platform requires, begging the question of why
a fee is being charged for a non-existent service.
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| PADALA NA! |
