Extending the deadline of the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) card transition without an improved rollout plan will prolong beneficiaries' frustration and panic, the Portfolio Committee on Social Development says.

Sassa officials will on Tuesday have to account to the committee on their plans, after the committee raised concerns that the deadline for the validity of the Sassa Gold Cards cannot be extended without a properly resourced and improved rollout plan for the Postbank Black Cards.

Postbank and Sassa have been accused of failing to ensure a smooth transition, forcing beneficiaries to endure long queues, network glitches and being turned away without completing their card replacements, and uncertainty about how they will receive their grants going forward. Postbank started replacing Sassa Gold Cards with the new Postbank Black Cards in September 2024.

Panic ensued when Sassa last month announced that grant payments that started in the week of 4 to 6 February would be the last payments made via the Sassa Gold Cards.

Sassa said beneficiaries who did not get Postbank Black Cards before the end of the February deadline would not be able to access their Sassa grant payments with the Sassa Gold Cards any longer.

However this deadline has since been extended from February 28 to March 20.

The portfolio committee noted that it had been inundated with calls and e-mails from beneficiaries and their families, who were frustrated with the lack of sites to issue the Black Cards.

“Older persons and people with disabilities are stuck in long queues and, at times, are turned away without receiving help. The scenes unfolding at the renewal sites are a violation of human rights.

“The committee believes that the deadline for the validity of the Sassa Gold Cards should be extended in conjunction with a properly resourced and statistically improved rollout plan for the Postbank Black Cards. It calls on Sassa to implement an outreach programme to older persons, people with disabilities homes, and old age homes to ensure that their Black Cards are issued at their places of residence, as Sassa policies provide for,” committee chairperson, Bridget Masango said.

Black Sash said the process had been plagued by several challenges which they had witnessed first-hand during the grant payment week earlier this month.

Black Sash spokesperson, Oliver Meth said: “Sites that have been selected by Postbank do not necessarily reflect where Sassa card holders live and even accessing information to your ‘closest’ site has been plagued by inaccurate information on the USSD platform and even on social media. Some sites do not exist, and the retailers share that they are not aware that Postbank card replacements were supposed to be happening at their stores. We found beneficiaries unclear about where their February grant payment was and were now being pushed to the Postbank Black card, without proper recourse addressing the February non-payment or explaining what would happen or should happen, if non-payment continued.

“Massive network glitches that always happen on grant pay days which force Postbank to have to turn away clients and ask them to return when the network is up and running. Beneficiaries who travel from far away do not have the necessary funds to return, except on the next grant pay day and may fall foul of the deadline to replace their cards.”

They also said that beneficiaries who had swapped over to the Postbank Black cards allegedly experienced short payments on their grants and were unable to be assisted by the Postbank staff responsible for card beneficiaries.

Social Development MEC Jaco Londt said his office had also been inundated with queries and complaints.

“Many of the complaints are centered around the lack of Postbank sites in rural areas. The offices also need to be adequately staffed to deal with the influx of beneficiaries. We have been pressuring SASSA and Postbank to address the flaws we have found in the card migration process. This is still a huge concern, as we cannot leave vulnerable residents living in rural areas behind in this process,” said Londt.

Postbank said they would be increasing the number of sites nationwide and have more roving teams who would move from area to area.

“The replacements of Sassa Gold Cards with the Postbank Black Cards is implemented in accordance with a detailed Postbank-Sassa rollout plan, the implementation of which commenced in 2024. With the extension of the deadline from 28 February to 20 March, part of the reason of which is meant to grant grant beneficiaries additional time to replace their cards, and also address some of challenges associated with the increase in queues in some areas primarily due to many customers responding closer to the deadline, the plan has been augmented with necessary interventions and critical drastic measures directed at adding more capacity through increasing the number of available sites nationwide as well as increasing the number of tellers in the existing sites.

“In addition Postbank and Sassa, as part of this plan, will be adding to the number of roving teams that are moving from area to area replacing cards within the communities, including outlying and rural areas. The additional capacity will also manage queues in the distribution sites,” said Postbank spokesperson, Bongani Diako.

Sassa spokesperson, Andile Tshona added: “The Departments of Social Development and Communication and Digital Technologies together with their respective entities, SASSA and Postbank will appear before the Portfolio Committee Meeting on Social Development. SASSA and Postbank will give a brief on the rollout of Postbank Black cards.

“SASSA is working tirelessly and closely with Postbank to ensure that we reach all SASSA Gold Card users in all corners of the country to ensure that they are assisted to migrate before the 20th of March 2025.”

Cape Times