Postbank has appealed to grant beneficiaries to ignore rumours circulating that the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) gold Card has been changed and is no longer working.
Postbank suspended ATM withdrawals on SASSA gold cards in December leaving some Social Relief of Distress grant recipients frustrated.
Postbank says there was a system glitch which has since been resolved and beneficiaries can continue to access their money at ATMs, retailers as well as over the counter at the Post Office branches.
29 million South African citizens receive grants from SASSA.
Postbank’s spokesperson Bongani Diako says, “Postbank does acknowledge however that on Friday the sixth of January between 9am and 12am. We did have intermittent system challenges that did affect the payment of the grants in that period, that window period, however, we have been up and the system has been performing at the industry level since Friday. And as we speak today, the payments are processing fine.”
Civil society group #PayThe Grants South Africa has sounded the alarm on the missing payments of Gold card child recipients as the Post Bank faced what it calls external security challenges.
The Postbank has since apologised to recipients for the challenges assuring that the system is now running smoothly.
It’s been a frustrating time for some of the recipients who have woken up to no money in their accounts when it was due, causing unhappiness and anxiety for many as they prepare for the reopening of schools.
As the Postbank works at solving its challenges, Pay The Grants South Africa says some Social Relief of Distress grant recipients have not received their payments during December.
The organisation’s project manager Elizabeth Raiters recommends that SASSA reverts back to a manual system to deal with these challenges. Raiters suggests that a universal basic income grant of R1 500 per recipient be implemented to offset the inflation pressure on the current grant.
The next cycle of payments will be made on the 3rd of February starting with older persons’ pension grant followed by all other payments up to the 8th February.-Additional reporting by Liabo Setho
Video | Hawks to investigate cyber attack at the Postbank
