SASSA runs the data – both for social grants and the social relief of distress grant – against the Department of Home Affairs’ Population Register before the payments are extracted for the following month. All deaths that have been registered with Department of Home Affairs result in the payment not being extracted. However, deaths that are reported late, or after the extraction date will result in payments for the specific beneficiary being extracted.
The information provided below is for the payment vouchers extracted after the date of death of the beneficiary. This information is not grant specific, but linked to a beneficiary, who may receive more than one grant. Further analysis is required to be able to specify this by grant type. For the period January 2020 to 31 October 2021, a total of 214 344 vouchers were extracted after the death of the beneficiary. However, this does not reflect the numbers actually paid out as in some cases, the money paid has already been recovered, or returned to SASSA by SAPO.
The total number of vouchers for the R350 social relief of distress grant extracted after the death of the beneficiary for the period under discussion is 59 089. Again, this is the total number of vouchers extracted, but the actual number paid out will only be known on receipt of the full reconciliation from SAPO.