Africa-Press – South-Africa. Johannesburg – The Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) says it has measures in place to deal with employers who have been accused of not paying over owed Ters payments to workers.
The Temporary Employer/employees Relief Scheme was introduced last year as part of the government’s social benefit methods for employees who were unable to work during the lockdown.
Employers were tasked with applying on behalf of employees who were unable to work and, in turn, were tasked with ensuring the payments were forwarded to workers.
The scheme has since been marred by allegations of corruption, as evidenced in a Corruption Watch investigation.
The organisation, which focuses on corruption-related matters, said it had received more than 100 complaints from disgruntled employees who accused their employers of short-changing them of their Ters payments.
A total of 88% of complaints received by the organisation were from employees. The industries with the most complaints included the private sector security, food and beverages services, fuel sales services and construction.
Gauteng came out tops with a total of 57 complaint reports, followed by the Western Cape with 15 and KwaZulu-Natal with 12.
The nature of the allegations reported varied, but the most dominant category of complaint was that employers were not paying over received Ters amounts from the UIF to employees, the report stated.
“Many employees (77) suspected that their employers had pocketed the TERS money instead of paying it over to them. A number of employees checked the department of labour’s website and, determining that the money had been paid out, confronted their employers about it. In seven such cases, the employer said that they had paid the money back to the Department of Labour (DoL),” the report stated.
Another prominent concern was that employers were not paying over the entire Ters payments due to employees.
“In nine instances, the employer paid employees less TERS monies than received from the Department of Labour. Several employers claimed TERS for employees who were not actually working, and some claimed for employees who had left their employ and who then could not access UIF benefits.”
Corruption Watch found that many employees were left stranded with a slow administrative justice process, as the funds were not available when needed the most.
“Many of the affected employees explained their sense of urgency arising from being unable to pay their expenses such as rent, purchase of food, buying of airtime, or paying for transport.”
In the report’s recommendations, Corruption Watch said the “fusion centre”, tasked with investigating Covid-19 linked corruption, should look into employers for possibly engaging in tax evasion.
Another recommendation was investigations into labour department inspectors who were accused of taking bribes for overlooking the side-stepping of regulations.
The organisation, in addition, said there was a need to ensure that the UIF claims system should be changed to ensure that they better served the turnaround strategy.
UIF spokesperson Makhosonke Buthelezi said the fraud hotline was available to employees who have disputes over unpaid Ters benefits. He said in many instances the organisation’s risk management conducted investigations where cases of corruption were reported.
“Some of the cases are referred to the law enforcement agencies for further investigation. Also, we have a team of audit firms that are currently visiting all employers who received the Ters benefit. They are checking if monies received have been paid to employees as agreed with the fund, and in cases where monies were not paid, they have to return it to the fund or face the law,” Buthelezi said.
The fund had an initial budget of R40 billion to be spent on Ters. To date, the scheme has spent over R57bn in payouts.
On Monday, President Cyril Ramaphosa indicated during his address to Nedlac that he was willing to go into negotiations over Ters concerns raised by labour unions.
Political Bureau
