Air Mail Contracts Rate and Fund Amendment

Section 1 amends Section 1 of Commonwealth Act No. 223 by authorizing the Secretary of Public Works and Communications, with the approval of the President of the Philippines, to enter air mail transportation contracts.
The contracts cover transportation of mails by air between any points within the Philippines.
Contract duration may be set from time to time for periods not to exceed five years.
The authorization applies to contracts for the transportation of mails by air using airplane routes within the Philippines.

Section 1 limits the base rate of pay for awarding such air mail contracts so that it shall in no case exceed one peso per airplane mile.
The rate limit applies to the transportation of a mail load not to exceed three hundred pounds.
In fixing the base rate of pay, the passenger capacity of the planes carrying the mails must be taken into consideration.
Payment for transportation is computed at the base rate fixed in the contract for the first three hundred pounds of mail or fraction thereof.
For payment beyond the first three hundred pounds, the law requires plus one-tenth of such base rate for each additional one hundred pounds of mail or fraction thereof.
The law requires computation at the end of each calendar month, based on the average mail load carried by mile over the route during such months.

Section 2 appropriates PHP 300,000 as additional fund for the extension of air routes and for the increase in base rate of the air mail contracts.
The appropriation is made from any funds in the Philippine Treasury not otherwise appropriated.
Section 2 requires that in subsequent years, the sum of PHP 450,000 must be included in the Appropriation Act.
Section 2 provides that the unexpended balance at the end of such year shall revert to the unappropriated general funds in the Philippine Treasury.