SAPO confident it has capacity to deliver grants
The South African Post Office's
(SAPO) chief executive officer Mark Barnes is confident that they can
successfully deliver social grants to 17 million South Africans.
SAPO struck a deal with South Africa Social Security Agency (SASSA) after the Constitutional Court order declared current service provider Cash Paymaster Services' (CPS) contract invalid. The highest court in the land ordered that the CPS contract be terminated and another service provider be considered to carry out the job.
This led to the finalisation of a deal between SASSA and SAPO, with Minister in the Presidency for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Jeff Radebe being appointed as the person responsible for ensuring a smooth implementation process of the transition deal.
Barnes is positive that SAPO has the capacity to deliver social grants.
''All operational measurements at SAPO have been going well for the past two years, so we can absolutely rest assured that SAPO will deliver these grants.
''The payments of social grants is not the most sophisticated or challenging delivery system to ensure, it's just big. It’s a matter of capacity and you can always build capacity.''
The deal between both state entities was finalised last month and the services agreement was entered into last week on Tuesday - just before the Constitutional Court deadline on Friday.
Barnes warns that before the implementation rollout, expected to begin on April 1, they still need to educate grant recipients about the changes.
The implementation plan has the option for recipients to migrate to the banking sector, but because banks are profit-driven, SASSA says it in discussions with commercial banks for the establishment of a special low-cost bank account for grant recipients.