Full 15% SSS contribution for self-employed members.
Monthly contribution
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Salary credit (MSC)
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Regular SS
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WISP
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Why a self-employed member carries the whole bill
When you draw a salary from an employer, your SSS contribution is split. The company shoulders the larger slice and your payslip shows only the employee portion. Register as a self-employed or voluntary member and that split disappears. There is no employer behind you, so you fund both halves out of your own pocket. That is the single most important thing this calculator exists to show: the rate you pay is not the 5 percent an office worker sees, it is the full combined rate, which this tool models at 15 percent of your monthly salary credit.
The salary credit, abbreviated MSC, is the figure your contribution is actually computed on, and it is not simply whatever you earn. SSS clamps it. The floor this calculator applies is PHP 5,000 and the ceiling is PHP 35,000. Declare PHP 2,000 of monthly income and you are still charged against PHP 5,000. Declare PHP 80,000 and you are charged only against PHP 35,000. Everything in between maps one to one. So the practical minimum monthly contribution lands near PHP 750, which is 15 percent of the PHP 5,000 floor, and the practical maximum is PHP 5,250, which is 15 percent of the PHP 35,000 ceiling.
Two layers hiding inside one payment
The number you remit is one figure, but it splits into two destinations. The first PHP 20,000 of your salary credit funds regular SS, the pool that pays sickness, maternity, disability, and the lifetime retirement pension. Any salary credit above PHP 20,000, up to the PHP 35,000 ceiling, is diverted into the WISP, a mandatory provident layer that behaves more like an investment account than traditional insurance. The calculator breaks these apart for you so you can see how much of your money is buying classic benefits and how much is quietly building a retirement balance.
A PHP 25,000 declaration, broken down
Take the tool's default. You declare PHP 25,000 of monthly earnings. That sits cleanly inside the floor and ceiling, so your salary credit is PHP 25,000. The full rate this calculator applies is 15 percent, giving a total monthly contribution of PHP 3,750. Of that, the first PHP 20,000 slice funds regular SS at 15 percent, which is PHP 3,000, and the remaining PHP 5,000 slice feeds the WISP at 15 percent, which is PHP 750.
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A common mistake: under-declaring to save money
Plenty of freelancers and small business owners declare the lowest salary credit they can to keep the monthly outflow small. It feels thrifty, but it quietly shrinks the pension you will collect decades later, because that pension is built on your average salary credit over your contributing years. There is a real tradeoff here, not a free lunch. If you can comfortably carry the contribution, declaring a higher credit is one of the few ways a self-employed Filipino can grow a state pension at all. Treat this tool as a way to test what a higher declaration costs you per month before you commit to it.
One practical tip: the contribution schedule, the rate, and the salary-credit brackets are revised by SSS from time to time, and the staged rate increases under the Social Security Act have moved the headline rate upward over several years. Confirm the current figures directly with the SSS before you lock in a declaration, since the numbers this calculator applies are an assumption for illustration, not a certified current table.
Do voluntary members pay the same as the self-employed?
Yes, in the way that matters here. Voluntary members, including non-working spouses and former employees who keep paying on their own, are treated like self-employed members for contribution purposes. They carry the full combined rate on their chosen salary credit with no employer to share it. The split between regular SS and WISP works identically.
Is the contribution due every month?
Self-employed and voluntary members generally remit on a schedule tied to their applicable period, and many choose to pay monthly while others pay quarterly. Missing a period does not usually trigger a penalty the way an employer's late remittance does, but gaps reduce the months that count toward your benefits. For exact deadlines and accepted payment channels, check your My.SSS account or the SSS directly.