Short answer. Five working days after the posting and publication requirement is completed. Posting alone runs ten consecutive days, and it starts only once the registrar finds the petition sufficient in form and substance — so the deadline is measured from that point, not from the day you filed.
What the law says
The city or municipal civil registrar or the consul general shall act on the petition and shall render a decision not later than five (5) working days after the completion of the posting and/or publication requirement.
RA 9048, Section 6 — Posting Decision And Transmittal. Read the full provision →
What the law says
He shall post the petition in a conspicuous place provided for that purpose for ten (10) consecutive days after he finds the petition and its supporting documents sufficient in form and substance.
RA 9048, Section 6 — Posting Decision And Transmittal. Read the full provision →
Three periods, running in sequence
The section sets out a chain rather than a single deadline. The officer examines the petition and its supporting documents; He shall post the petition in a conspicuous place provided for that purpose for ten (10) consecutive days after he finds the petition and its supporting documents sufficient in form and substance. Then The city or municipal civil registrar or the consul general shall act on the petition and shall render a decision not later than five (5) working days after the completion of the posting and/or publication requirement. He then transmits the decision and the records to the Office of the Civil Registrar General within five working days of the decision.
The step with no clock on it
Read the trigger for the posting period carefully: it begins after the officer finds the petition and its supporting documents sufficient in form and substance. The section gives him no deadline for reaching that finding. So the stage between handing over your papers and the posting going up is the one the statute does not time, and in practice it is where most of the waiting happens — usually because something in the supporting documents is being queried. That is an argument for arriving with a complete file rather than for chasing the office afterwards.
A change of first name takes longer
Note the phrase posting and/or publication. For a clerical or typographical correction there is only posting, so the decision is due five working days after the ten days of posting end. For a change of first name, Section 5 requires publication at least once a week for two consecutive weeks in a newspaper of general circulation, and that requirement must also be completed before the decision clock starts. The two weeks sit inside the timeline rather than beside it, which is one more reason the two kinds of petition should never be estimated the same way.
The dates worth writing down
Because everything is measured from the sufficiency finding rather than from filing, that is the date to ask for and record — along with the first and last days of the posting period, and the dates of publication where it applies. Those four dates are what make the five-working-day deadline checkable. Note as well that the decision is not the end of the paperwork: the officer has a further five working days to transmit his decision and the records of the proceedings to the Office of the Civil Registrar General.
Related provisions
- RA 9048, Section 3 — Who May File And Where
- RA 9048, Section 5 — Form Contents And Publication
- RA 9048, Section 6 — Posting Decision And Transmittal