The Philippine IT-Business Process Management (IT-BPM) industry is disturbed by how unregistered and unregulated business process outsourcing (BPO) companies are “shamelessly abusing” Filipino workers working in the lowest rung of the artificial intelligence (AI) subsector, an industry leader said Thursday.
This may depict a negative image of how unprofessional and unskilled Filipino workers are in the IT-BPM space, as revealed in a recent Washington Post report of such an unregulated firm based in Mindanao.
In an exclusive interview with Manila Standard, IT-Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) president Jack Madrid said incidents such as the reported BPO sweatshops in Cagayan de Oro City have nothing to do with legitimate IT-BPM companies operating in the Philippines.
“What’s going on with this story has nothing to do with our industry.
But obviously, we are and we will be affected to a certain extent because I think it positions us, some of our labor force, potentially being perceived as not skilled. But this is happening in other poorer countries other than the Philippines,” he said.
“Anything that is negative will affect all of us,” Madrid added, noting that the business group is not aware of the extent of how unregistered BPO activities are exploiting, allegedly, millions of Filipinos employed in the lowest rung of the AI subsector.
The Washington Post identified the foreign firm involved as Scale AI, based in San Francisco, California. It owns a platform called Remotasks, which has hired several Filipino “taskers” since 2017.
Several of the workers interviewed told the American newspaper they’ve had payments from the platform delayed, reduced, or canceled after completing tasks.
The workers interviewed by the Post said they often earn far below the minimum wage in the Philippines, though at times they admitted they do make more than the minimum.
Scale AI does work for firms like Meta/Facebook, Microsoft, and generative AI companies like Open AI, the creator of ChatGPT, the Post reported.
Madrid emphasized that the IBPAP represents industry players who are registered business enterprises (RBEs) — investors and locators who have set up operations in the Philippines as legitimate IT-BPM businesses registered with the Philippine Economic Zoe Authority (PEZA) or the Board of Investments (BOI).
Their practices as investors are regulated by the government, Madrid added.
He believes that the unnamed workforce in the Washington Post article is involved in the business of providing data labeling to provide AI-related data.
“It’s not a very complex task. In fact, I’m guessing it’s a very repetitive and monotonous task. I don’t think it needs much training,” he said, noting that the IT-BPM industry hires only the most competent and skilled workers.
The group said the government needs to take steps to begin to regulate the unregistered companies and communicate to the public the risks of accepting jobs from companies that are not registered in the Philippines.
Madrid added that the regulatory agencies should be more alert and vigilant not to allow illicit BPO firms to operate, put workers at a disadvantage, and hurt legitimate BPM companies.
“My own conclusion from all of this, from the vantage point of the IT-BPM industry is that I think this highlights the opportunity for the Philippines to upskill its labor force, because as you know, we are a world capital of ITBPM,” he said.