Sassa card-swap sees an influx of people

More resources to equip the overstretched South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) offices are needed otherwise staff might decide to quit.

This comes according to Bridget Masango, Democratic Alliance’s Member of Parliament and Shadow Minister of the National Department of Social Development, visiting the offices in De Villiers Street on 17 August.

The visit forms part of the portfolio committee overseeing the agency and to also monitor the new grants pay system, which came into effect in May.

The old white cards would be fully phased out by 30 September and will be swapped with the new gold Sassa cards.

Following the visit, Masango said the office is overburdened adding that they do not have sufficient staff to deal with the influx of people seeking to use the services.

She said the department has failed to properly plan for the new transition, accused government of ‘killing’ the morale of their staff and said there is no political will to fix the mess. “This office is overstretched and its coverage is too wide,” she said.

“There are still cubicles that are not open to enable the public to be served effectively. They also do not have enough resources for their staff to get the work done and they have to work long hours.”

The shadow minister said she imagines the staff pulling out their employment cards saying they only signed up for what is in their contracts. The office is responsible for various services related to social security and essential services, including the application of new Sassa cards, lost cards as well as pin-resetting and now it’s card-swapping again.

Reacting to these, Sassa local office team leader, Denis Moleki, acknowledged that much still needs to be done to equip the office to deal with the crisis.

About the cubicles that still remain vacant, he said they were recently installed and they are waiting to connect them to their network.

“We recently extended this office and we are still waiting for the renovations to be done and the cubicles will then be connected to the data network.

“The reason we are flooded is due to the new card-swapping and most of the people we get are not even from around here – but we don’t mind to help,” he said.

The office assists people from as far as from Soweto, Vosloorus, Ivory Park and various other areas including in the nearby Yeoville, Berea and Hillbrow. Moleki said they get about 9 000 people a day to do card swapping only and thus the flooding.

Details: www.sassa.gov.za

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