• SASSA has announced the payment dates for various social grants for the holiday period.
• Pensioner’s grants will be released first on Friday 1st December 2023, followed by disability grants on the 4th and children’s grants on the 5th.
• The agency says that there is no need to rush to withdraw the grants as the money will remain in beneficiary accounts until it is withdrawn.

It hasn’t been the best year for the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA). Earlier this year the scheme struggled to pay recipients due to a series of technical issues that stopped the withdrawal of grants from ATMs.

Around 600 000 SASSA beneficiaries were unable to collect their grants in September because of this technical problem. The agency soon claimed that the problem was fixed and that beneficiaries were all paid on time.

Now as the year comes to a close, SASSA is keen to inform beneficiaries of when they can expect to receive their grants in the holiday season. “There is no need to rush to withdraw cash on the first day. Once the money is in the account, it will remain there until it is needed,” the agency said.

According to SA News, SASSA will release payments for the various social grants beginning 1st December 2023.

• Older persons/pensioner’s grant: payments will begin from Friday 1st December 2023.
• Disability grant: payments will begin from Monday 4th December 2023,
• Children’s grant: payments will begin from Tuesday 5th December 2023.

“All grant beneficiaries are reminded that SASSA gold cards will not expire in December and will continue to work for grant payments beyond December 2023,” it added.

SASSA beneficiaries can receive their payments from selected supermarkets, such as Pick n Pay, Boxer, USave merchants, Checkers and Shoprite, and obtain this through their SASSA card and heading to an ATM or by getting the amount directly transferred into their bank account.

Beneficiaries are advised to beware of inputting any important information into non-official SASSA websites, which could be used by criminals to farm personal data or launch personalised attacks.

According to the government, the only official sources for grant information are those that have .GOV.ZA in their URL.

These include:

• “WWW.SASSA.GOV.ZA,
• WWW.DSD.GOV.ZA,
• WWW.SRD.SASSA.GOV.ZA.”

All other sites should be considered fraudulent and are to be avoided, whether they are giving out legitimate information or not. For a rundown of how to check your SASSA or SRD grant status online, click here.