Every month, millions of South Africans receive social grants from the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA).
However, there was great disappointment, frustration and anger when grant recipients went to collect their grants from the Post Office at the beginning of November.
A media release put out by Sassa read as follows:
“Sassa social grants recipients using the Sassa gold cards are advised to collect their monies at retailers and ATMs, as over the counter withdrawals at Post Office outlets are affected by system glitches.
“Withdrawals of social grants can be made at any retail outlets nationwide that provides the cashback functionality which includes Shoprite, Checkers, Usave, Pick n Pay and Boxer.
“Sassa grants recipients can also use the Sassa gold cards to make purchases at any place that accepts bank card transactions as the Sassa gold cards function fully within the national payments system similarly to any other bank card.
“The system glitch within Post Office outlets also affects all Postbank customers wishing to make over-the-counter transactions that include deposits and withdrawals.
“We apologise to our Sassa social grants beneficiaries and Postbank customers for the inconvenience caused as we take every service interruption seriously.”
“Our IT teams have been tasked to resolve the technical challenges affecting the over the counter branch transactions as a matter of urgency. All customers are advised to utilise retailers and ATMs as alternatives while we are working on retaining full service availability within Post Office branches,” says Postbank interim CEO Lucas Ndala.
“We reassure all our customers and stakeholders that their overall experience of Postbank and the services we offer remain our top priority. Postbank will send out a notification once the matter is resolved.”
“Sassa uses a fully functional bank card that is compatible with all access points within the National Payment System, thereby limiting the impact on clients when the system of one bank, merchant or pay point is down. We will continue to diversify these channels as much as possible to reduce the reliance on any one particular access point as we continue to pay the right social grant, to the right person, at the right time and place,” adds acting Sassa CEO Abraham Mahlangu.
On October 27, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana announced that the R350 social relief of distress grants (SRD) will be extended until March 2024, while government was looking at a possible replacement grant.
This grant is hugely important to so many people, yet Sassa just cannot seem to get its act together when it comes to the R350 SRD grant. It’s crazy!
There has been a lot of confusion around the payment date of the R350 grant. This sees many people travelling long distances only to be told that their grant isn’t being paid out on that date.
Sassa Mpumalanga recently released a statement which clarified that the date that appears on a status of R350 grant is not a payment date. It said:
“South African Social Security Agency in Mpumalanga would like to inform R350 SRD grant beneficiaries that the date that appears on a status of R350 grant is not a payment date but it is a date where the grant was captured in the system. After the grant is captured in the system the beneficiary can receive the SMS at any time.
“This is not a payment date. Beneficiaries must wait for SMS payment before they go to withdraw the grant from merchants or banks.
“This caution and awareness is created to assist beneficiaries not to incur unnecessary costs and fruitless travelling which results in many complaints received to date.
“The Agency is reminding the beneficiaries to check their contact details to ensure that they are still correct.”
To verify or change contact details beneficiary must login to the official website which is https://srd.sassa.gov.za.Beneficiaries
For more information contact our toll free number: 0800 60 10 11 or 013 574 9428/9363 from 07:30 – 16:00 during weekdays Monday – Friday.
Enquiries:
Senzeni Ngubeni
Tel: 013 754 9367
Cell: 083 556 9626
E-mail: senzenin@sassa.gov.za
For those who have applied for the R350 SRD grant, but still have not received an answer, here is how you can track your R350 grant application status Via WhatsApp
Add 082 046 8553 as a contact
Open your WhatsApp and refresh your contacts
Open a chat with the (082 046 8553) number you have saved
Send a message to the number saying ‘status.’
Now you will be able to check the progress on your grant.
Once your chat has been received, you will then be required to provide your ID number and the cellphone number you used when applying for the grant.
I really do wish that Sassa would get its house in order and give our people the service they deserve – but I sadly won’t get my hopes up.
dailyvoice@inl.co.za