Grant beneficiaries to note pay days

The government has urged social grant beneficiaries to take note of their respective pay days, which appears on the slips received on their previous pay date in March 2017.

“Beneficiaries receiving social grants from merchants and banks will be paid on 1 April 2017, while those using South Africa Social Security Agency (SASSA) pay points will be paid from 3 April 2017. The SASSA call centre, toll free: 0800 60 10 11 will be open to assist beneficiaries with all their enquiries,” Cabinet said in statement yesterday.

Cabinet added that arrangements have been made to en- sure that the SOCPEN system, a legacy information management system which is used for processing grants applications, is available for investigation and verification of the status of grant applications.

The government has also welcomed the Constitutional Court’s judgment on the payment of grants.

The Constitutional Court extended SASSA’s contract with Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) for a year, in order to fulfil the constitutional obligation of paying social grants to beneficiaries.

Cabinet said the Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) on Comprehensive Social Securi- ty, chaired by President Jacob Zuma, has been hard at work to ensure that government continues to pay more than 17 million social grants to qualifying beneficiaries from 1 April 2017.

“Government’s social assistance programme remains an important safety net for millions of South Africans. It is at the heart of government’s poverty alleviation programme, and has helped to restore the dignity of our people.

We are a caring government, continually striving to improve the living conditions of poor, vulnerable and underprivileged South Africans,” Cabinet said.