8 reasons why the Post Office believes it should run social grant payments

14 March 2017 - 15:34 By Neo Goba
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South African Post Office
South African Post Office
Image: SUPPLIED

The South African Post Office (Sapo) has given eight reasons why they believe they're capable of distributing social grant payments from next month.

The Constitutional Court is due on Wednesday to hear oral arguments from the Post Office on why they should be given the mammoth responsibility.

In court papers‚ attorneys for the Post Office wrote to the Black Sash asking for approval for an application to be admitted as amicus curiae (friend of the court) in the Black Sash's application to the court.

This follows the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) not having a payment plan to date to ensure that over 17 million beneficiaries receive their grants when its contract with current service provider - Cash Paymaster Service (CPS) - comes to an end this month.

The Post Office gives the following reasons why they should be given the contract with Sassa:

1. Sapo is capable of delivering a robust interim solution in 3 - 6 months‚ covering current services delivered by Cash Paymaster Service.

2. Sapo is capable of delivering a robust longer-term solution‚ taking into account RFI (request for information) requirements in 9 - 12 months.

3. Sapo has adequate current funding to deliver these services‚ whilst contract negotiations take place in parallel (if necessary). 4. Sapo has the requisite skill and knows how to manage a payment system of this nature‚ with several experienced bankers in the executive and management team.

5. In time‚ the function of the Sapo must move towards being the national paymaster for all interactions between government and its people. The transactional and revenue opportunities that Sassa grants‚ would bring the timetable on this forward significantly.

6. This would enable Sapo to extend its reach beyond physical branches‚ into deep rural areas‚ to become a more effective conduit for government to citizen services.

7. Sapo will add the current 10 000 pay points (owned and managed by the incumbents CIT partner) to its 1520 online branches and bring all postal agencies online to add 2500 branches in total.

8. Sapo could engage with appropriate groups of spaza shops and stokvels to utilise their networks (we are aware of one network of 230 000 spaza shops that we could bring online in a matter of months).

- TMG Digital

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