How to avoid pension fraud
We’ve covered a few scams that target pensioners on Consumerwatch, but this is the lowest of the low - pinching their part of their pensions before they’re even paid out.
Sadly, a lot of the fraud is done by officials whose job is it to get pension and other grants to those who need it; the most vulnerable, most financially unstable people in our community, people whose only income is what they get from government in the form of that monthly grant.
Mavis Weston's story
I’ve heard from quite a few pensioners who’ve had someone help themselves to a portion of their R1400 monthly grant, among them 85-year-old Mavis Weston of Montclair.
She’d always been paid out her full pension at the beginning of every month, until this month, when instead of being handed R1400 by the Pick n Pay teller, she was handed just R900.
She tried to get answers from the SA Social Security Agency’s or SASSA’s Durban office, she says, but the number she found in the phone book went unanswered for two days.
Turns out Mavis is by no means alone. In KZN, which has the highest incidence of grant fraud, in the nine months from April last year to January, there were 1328 reported cases of grant fraud - that’s a few hundred a month with a mysterious spike of more than 3000 in July last year.
Syndicates working with corrupt SASSA officials scam pensioners and other grant beneficiaries in three main ways - creating funeral policies in their names, buying pre-paid airtime and electricity and applying for loans in their names - all of which means less money on pension pay-out day for their victims.
Wendy takes up the case with SASSA
I took up Mavis’s case and another with SASSA’s senior manager for grants administration in KZN, Andrew Brewer.
He came back to me a day later to say that Mavis had fallen victim to not one, but two types of pension grant fraud - airtime, at R100 a time, was bought, and an electronic loan application was made in her name. "R1000 was added to her balance, but that loan hadn’t yet been drawn, so obviously they were planning to do that with a cloned card.”
Leave Mavis to pay for it by means of pension deductions every month, of course.
Protecting your PIN
As for how the fraudsters manage to get access to pensioners’ SASSA accounts, Brewer says some grant beneficiaries are open to suggestion about PIN selection for their grant cards.
“When the official prompts the beneficiary to enter their 4-digit PIN, if the beneficiary hesitates, they may suggest the first four numbers of their ID, or 1,2,3,4. If they do that, the official has a very good idea of what it could be, and when the beneficiary then hands over their card, a swap could take place, the official handing over a blank card and keeping the beneficiary’s one…”
In the 2014/15 financial year, the year in which R29 million of grant fraud was reported, countrywide, 266 officials were suspended and 53 dismissed. Eleven cases were referred to the police and five officials were convicted.
Meanwhile, Mavis’s card will be blocked and a new one issued, and no doubt she’ll come up with a very secure PIN. Best of all, she won’t have to leave her home in order to do this - SASSA officials will visit here, in her home, and sort out all the paperwork…
“Any beneficiary who is frail, disabled, or over the age of 75 and cannot make it to any of our 76 local offices, can contact us (details below) and we will come over and do a home visit and complete all the documentation,” Brewer said.
"I don’t want Mrs Weston going to the police station, I don’t want her going anywhere, I want her to let me know when she’s at home and I will make sure one of our officials out there to be able to process the documentation and get that refund…”
Of course, Mavis is delighted and looking forward to getting this matter resolved.
How to avoid grant fraud
1. Choose a four-digit PIN yourself - don’t be open to suggestion by anyone - and don’t make it too obvious. Don’t divulge it to anyone.
2. Be mistrustful of anyone phoning you and claiming to be calling from SASSA and asking for personal information. End the call and contact SASSA yourself.
3. If you forget your PIN, go to a SASSA office to reset it.
4. If your card is lost or stolen, call the help desk to put a stop on it and get an affidavit from a police station stating what happened.
5.Don’t let anyone take possession of your SASSA card for any reason. It is illegal for a micro lender to withhold a bank card or SASSA card.
Funeral policies are the only direct deductions legally allowed on a beneficiary grant. If you've been a victim of pension fraud and need help getting your money back, report it to SASSA immediately, and also let us know: [email protected]
See contact details below:
National SASSA call centre number: 0800 60 10 11
SASSA office, KZN: 033 846 3400
Email: [email protected]