Update
GEORGE NEWS - Technical difficulties that severely affected the payout of social grants to elderly customers who were using their South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) gold cards, were resolved by last Thursday, 7 September.
According to a statement by Postbank Sassa, the issues experienced with gold cards have been resolved for all ATM and post office branch transactions.
This followed after many elderly citizens had to queue for two days straight without any luck of receiving their grants. Apart from technical difficulties, load shedding causes customers much pain, since the post office does not have a generator.
During a two- to four-hour shift of load shedding, all customers are asked to leave the premises.
Cash problems
On Monday 11 September, a Sassa client contacted George Herald, saying the post office had a cash flow problem which hindered Sassa payouts.
"It seems as if Sassa is not communicating sufficiently with the post office about the current crisis around allowances. People are being sent to the post office while the post office has no money to pay out. At least someone helped me to receive payment through a shop. I hope the unhappiness ends soon."
Post Office reply:
“There is a problem with the Postbank issuing of monies to the conduits of payments for instance to retailers and the post office which is also a conduit.
We are trying to understand the issue with Postbank, who runs this matter.”
Beneficiaries
Sassa beneficiaries were advised last week to give the process at least 24 hours before attempting any further transactions. Many accounts were declined for two full working days, Tuesday and Wednesday.
"Postbank's technical teams are working on restoring the transactions inside the retailers to full capacity as there are still intermittent challenges with transactions performed through this channel," reads their statement on Thursday. "We apologise to our valued customers for the inconvenience caused by this incident and thank them for their patience.
"Postbank will continue providing detailed updates."
Cards valid
Social grants recipients were advised that the technical challenge experienced with grants withdrawals is an isolated incident, that is not related to the validity of the Postbank Sassa Gold Cards. "Sassa Gold Cards remain valid as a means to accessing social grants payments, despite the expiry date written on the cards, until Postbank replaces the cards within the cards replacement period granted to us by the Reserve Bank," said Postbank.
For more information on Sassa cards and issues, visit here.
Load shedding woes: Elderly not guaranteed to receive SASSA payments today
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