Social Development

- Postbank experienced what it called “system challenges” which  led to a number of beneficiaries being unable to access their January SASSA grants. There were various news reports about the impact on beneficiaries. Our office also received complaints about beneficiaries who experienced difficulties accessing their money.

1. whether she is aware of any mitigation strategies that (a) the Postbank or (b) Sassa has put in place to prevent these issues during the February 2023 grant disbursements?

• a) Postbank issued a statement in January saying it had fixed its system glitches, but did not go into detail how it fixed it or what the cause of the issue was in the first place.
• b) Minister Fernandez requested that SASSA be placed on the agenda of the first MINMEC meeting on 24 January 2023 so that SASSA could explain what it is doing to mitigate problems related to Postbank. In this meeting national minister of social development Lindiwe Zulu admitted it is a serious issue that needs to be discussed, but that she wasn’t satisfied with SASSA’s current plans and that she’s giving the Agency time to come up with a comprehensive response in a later meeting with the MECs. During Minister Fernandez’s visit to SASSA offices and the Post Office in Athlone, she heard from several beneficiaries that their money hasn’t been paid into their accounts, so it seems the same issue from January prevailed into February.