Retired Ballito journalist has pension stolen at Umzinto while trapped in locked-down Dubai

Marie Frampton was stuck in Dubai during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, only to arrive back to have her pension stolen.

Frampton (69) is a retired journalist who lives in Ballito, but was in Dubai for a year when her husband took a lecturing post.

The couple were stuck in the Middle East as the borders closed worldwide, but she was able to get a repatriation flight in August as she had a hip replacement scheduled.

“I got back and had the operation, but I was out of action for 6 weeks so I did not immediately check my pension account,” said Frampton.

When she was able to walk again, she went to withdraw the full amount as she had heard rumours of fraudulent cards being issued.

Her worst fears were realised as she found her account had been regularly drawn from while she was overseas and in recovery.

“I was lucky because I did not trust the system and I had my daughter draw the full amount earlier in the year, but there was still a few months worth of grants that were taken,” she said.

When she realised what had happened, Frampton immediately went to the post office to see what could be done.

“I was told that another card had been issued with my ID number, and that it is a common occurrence.”

The fraudulent card had been used to make withdrawals in Umzinto for almost two months as soon as there was money in the account.

“It is suspicious that no fraudulent activity was happening when I was regularly using the account, someone must have been monitoring it to see when it was not active.”

Frampton was able to get a fraud affidavit, and has had a new card issued, but is still waiting on the return of her stolen money.

“People need to be careful with grants of any kind because the system is so overloaded at the moment that things like this slip through the cracks.”

The Courier contacted the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) for comment but have not received a response.