Andre Lowe, Senior Staff Reporter

Latoya DaCosta, general manager of the Premier League Clubs Association (PLCA), has moved to clear the air, after several clubs competing in the Red Stripe Premier League complained of 'late' subvention payments.

Up to Monday morning, clubs competing in the island's top football competition were still awaiting an explanation from the PLCA, after not receiving sponsorship money for the month of January.

The PLCA is responsible for dispersing $400,000 in subvention to each of the 12 clubs participating in the league on a monthly basis; money sourced from the league's sponsorship package. Several club officials were upset after the $4.8 million owed to the clubs for the month of January was not paid over to their accounts, in what they described as an inordinate delay.

"January 25 has long gone and we have still not received any money from the PLCA, and worse, we have not got any explanation about the delay," said one club official, who asked not to be named.

No outlined deadline

However, DaCosta, who confirmed the delay, underlined that there is no outlined deadline for payment to the clubs, and further noted that the matter arose due to certain administrative procedures. DaCosta also dismissed the complaints as irresponsible.

The administrator told The Gleaner that her office received the sponsorship funds on Monday - four days into the new month, but that all payments were made available to the clubs later that afternoon.

"First of all, there is no agreement on any particular date or time for the payments to be made to the clubs; everyone knows that they are to be paid before the end of the month, and that can be the very last day of the month," said DaCosta.

"We had a little delay for last month's payments because we received the sponsorship payment a bit late. In fact, we got it about Monday afternoon and we then made the cheques available to the clubs," DaCosta added. "Some of the clubs asked us to lodge the payments to their bank accounts, and so that may have taken a while to clear for some organisations."

The PLCA receives approximately $107 million in sponsorship funds on a yearly basis, with title sponsors Red Stripe being the biggest contributors with a reported $40 million per year injection.

Other major sponsors include the Jamaica Public Service Company Limited, Supreme Ventures Limited, Jamaica National Building Society, and China Harbour.