The Department of Home Affairs (DHA) has upgraded its online booking system to curb the reported blocking and selling of branch appointments.

This was announced by Home Affairs Minister Dr Leon Schreiber, who said the new system aims to root out fraud and corruption as well as improve services.

“For too long, ordinary South Africans were disadvantaged by criminals who exploited weaknesses in the previous booking system to hoard appointment slots and sell them for profit,” said Dr Schreiber.

“The migration of our booking system to MyHomeAffairsOnline directly addresses this abuse by linking bookings to verified user profiles, strengthening the integrity of the system and protecting citizens’ access to services.”

Users are now required to create a MyHomeAffairsOnline profile linked to their South African ID number and email address before making a booking.

This seeks to ensure appointments remain available to legitimate clients.

“The upgrade follows years of abuse of the previous booking platform by syndicates and other unscrupulous individuals who exploited vulnerabilities in the system to block appointment slots and sell them on to desperate citizens.

“As a result, many ordinary South Africans struggled to secure appointments for essential Home Affairs services,” said Schreiber.

Don’t have the ZO app? Download it to your Android or Apple device here:

HAVE YOUR SAY

Like our Facebook page  and follow us on Twitter.

For news straight to your phone invite us:

WhatsApp – 060 784 2695

Instagram – zululand_observer

TikTok – @zululand_observer