VBSP: a helping hand to employees in COVID-19 times

VBSP's recent online conference on the deployment of payments for work suspension

This year, to timely resolve difficulties for people hit by the coronavirus pandemic, the government and the prime minister have enacted Resolution No.42/NQ-CP dated April 9, 2020 and Decision No.15/2020/QD-TTg dated April 24, 2020 presenting measures and policies to support people and businesses in COVID-19 times.

In light of these documents, the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies (VBSP) was tasked with lending to businesses facing financial difficulties to make work suspension payments to their employees.

Based on implementation practice, the government continued enacting Resolution No.154/NQ-CP dated October 19, 2020 amending and supplementing Resolution 42, and Decision No.32/2020/QD-TTg dated October 19, 2020 amending and supplementing Decision 15 to remove further difficulties for people and businesses.

Participants joining and exchanging remarks at VBSP’s online meeting in different locations

To ensure the effective enforcement of these legal documents, VBSP has presented professional guidance helping business leaders carry out suspension payments for their employees during the pandemic.

At the online conference, Deputy Minister of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs Le Van Thanh lauded VBSP for quickly bringing the government and the prime minister’s respective resolutions and decisions into life.

To bolster the efficiency of these supporting policies, Thanh asked the VBSP to keep communicating about the state support policies to management agencies from the central to local levels, keeping them and businesses well-informed about these support measures. Simultaneously, Thanh asked the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee, the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour, and diverse social and political organisations to effectively handle communication and supervisory activities to ensure that the right people benefit from the policies, avoiding negative phenomena and ensuring publicity and transparency during implementation.

Following the spirit of “lending to the right people with the utmost efficiency”, general director Duong Quyet Thang required the bank’s branch offices in different localities in the country to host training courses about this kind of lending to ensure its timely and effective implementation, making this task a top priority in the upcoming months.

VBSP’s top leader proposed local management agencies to continue paying attention to policy credit activities and lending to employers suspending payments to ensure the effectiveness of state policies, thus pushing back the pandemic threat while pushing up local socioeconomic development.