Thousands of elderly South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) grant beneficiaries received their payments yesterday.
At a post office in Ekurhuleni, beneficiaries were observed receiving their grants without experiencing problems.
Last month, Postbank’s payment systems left thousands of grant recipients unable to collect their money from ATMs, post offices, or retail stores. Postbank blamed technical glitches for the problem.
Sassa national spokesperson Paseka Letsatsi, speaking outside the Lenasia post office, said they were satisfied as the system was stable.
There were reports of a slow start at that particular post office as the branch manager allegedly intimidated some people. However, Letsatsi apologised for this incident.
“We have made interactions with other provinces. The report we received is that beneficiaries of social grants are getting their pay. Even here we are told that things are going well so far. We want to apologise for the misunderstanding which happened this morning. The branch manager is not a communicator, he is an operational manager and he might have misinterpreted certain things. We apologise and going forward we handled things properly,” said Letsatsi.
He urged people who encountered problems to report to them. Letsatsi said they were given assurance by Postbank that if any problem was picked up, they would communicate so that matters could be resolved.
Letsatsi said they were going to remain in the area until the last person received help.
In KwaZulu-Natal, Sassa beneficiaries yesterday were urged to collect money at ATMs and retailers including Boxer, Pick n Pay, Spar, Shoprite and Usave instead of South African Post Office branches.
This comes after many post office branches in KZN reported that they anticipated they would have insufficient cash in store as a result of cash delivery delays.
Postbank spokesperson Dr Bongani Diako said the Sassa gold cards operate like any other bank card and can be used to make cash withdrawals from any bank ATM.
He said the cards can also be used to make withdrawals over the till inside retail stores as well as make in-store purchases.
“Post office branches in KwaZulu-Natal will be open and operational to assist social grants beneficiaries with Sassa none-cash services such as PIN resets,” said Diako.
Letsatsi said people were able to access their money but were urged to go to ATMs and retailers. He said the problem might have to do with people transporting money to the centre.
“We were not happy last month that people left their places to go to the post office and not get money. We said to Postbank, please make sure that you work on issues of communication, which they did. Secondly, as long as there is money in the accounts of beneficiaries because people can use the infrastructure available, they don’t have to go to the post office when there’s no money,” Letsatsi said.
Sassa in Mpumalanga assured beneficiaries that the dates of October payment cycle was expected to be as smooth as can be after the system technical glitches experienced last month.
The October 2023 payment cycle is October 3 social grants payment for older persons, October 4 payment is for people living with disabilities, and as from October 5 it will be the payment of children grants categories.
“Sassa staff will be in most SAPO outlets and other payment platforms to monitor the payment and with an aim to assist beneficiaries with enquiries. The monitoring will be conducted for the first three payment days and they will assist any beneficiary that may be experiencing system payment-related challenges or non-payment due to failed bank verification and/or pending bank verification. In an eventuality of an unexpected non-payment (it) will be escalated to Postbank if related to a system glitch and be sorted out as quickly as possible,” said Sassa Mpumalanga spokesperson Senzeni Ngubeni.