Paying pensions to deceased people.

The pensioner died 7 years ago, but the Phu Yen Social Insurance agency still paid out benefits totaling nearly 400 million VND.

On the afternoon of August 15th, the Phu Yen Provincial Social Insurance agency announced that Ms. Huong (residing in Tuy Hoa City) is eligible for a monthly pension and receives her payments through her personal account. The payments are processed via the postal system.

On January 29, 2016, Ms. Huong passed away. Her family reported her death to the People's Committee of the ward but did not go to the social insurance agency to complete the procedures for funeral expenses and the lump-sum death benefit. Because they could not confirm Ms. Huong's death, the post office continued to regularly pay her pension through her account.

Recently, while verifying the citizen identification code, the Phu Yen Social Insurance agency discovered that Ms. Huong had passed away. From February 2016 to June 2023, the post office transferred 89 months of pension payments (over 4.4 million VND per month) to her personal account, totaling 392.2 million VND, and 2.8 million VND in Tet gifts from the Provincial People's Committee (400,000 VND per year).

At the time of discovery, Ms. Huong's account was short by over 150 million VND compared to the amount the post office had paid, due to withdrawals by relatives. After working with the authorities, her son agreed to process the payment of funeral expenses and a one-time death benefit for his mother and return the excess amount paid by the post office.

Individuals who have participated in social insurance for a sufficient number of years will be guaranteed a pension until their death upon reaching retirement age. (Photo: Dinh Van)

Speaking to VnExpress , Mr. Tran Van Toan, Director of the Phu Yen Social Insurance Department, said that he had requested the post office to recover the incorrectly disbursed funds. The relevant agencies are coordinating to assess the cause and procedures for issuing the death certificate. Once the cause is clearly identified, the insurance company will have a basis to consider calculating interest on the disbursed funds.

Following Ms. Huong's case, the Phu Yen Social Insurance agency is reviewing all pensioners to ensure they meet the eligibility requirements for continued benefits. This is both to learn from the experience and to prevent similar mistakes from happening again.

Not only in Phu Yen, but also in other localities, the payment of pensions to deceased individuals is occurring. The social insurance agency cites the reason as a lack of regulations requiring current pension recipients to verify their eligibility to continue receiving pensions with the paying unit.

Currently, pension payments are disbursed through the postal system in three ways: cash at the post office, bank account transfer, and authorized collection by another person, depending on the beneficiary's needs.

The terms of the cooperation agreement for pension payments between the Vietnam Social Security and the Vietnam Post Corporation require postal employees to periodically check the status of pension recipients annually. In addition, local post offices that have contracts with communes and wards must notify the system to stop payments when they receive notification of a pensioner's death.

Mr. Tran Dung Ha, Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Social Insurance Department, said that although the regulations exist, there are still cases where deceased individuals receive pensions, mainly those who registered to receive payments via bank accounts or authorized others to collect on their behalf. In Ho Chi Minh City, where there are over 251,000 pensioners, several such cases have been discovered, leading to the recovery of funds.

The reasons include beneficiaries moving to other localities, dying without their relatives reporting the death to their registered permanent residence, or emigrating abroad, making it impossible for postal workers and commune/ward officials to manage the records.

According to Mr. Ha, although pensioners who die will receive a funeral allowance equivalent to 10 months of the basic salary (currently 18 million VND), and a one-time or monthly survivor's benefit, it is not ruled out that relatives may find "receiving a monthly pension more advantageous than other allowances and therefore do not declare it."

Pension payments made directly at Phu Nhuan Post Office, August 14, 2023. Photo: An Phuong

To address this loophole, the Ho Chi Minh City Social Insurance agency previously required pensioners receiving pensions via bank accounts or through authorized representatives to periodically (every six months or a year) go to the nearest social insurance agency or commune/ward where they reside to confirm their eligibility to continue receiving benefits. This method proved effective and has been implemented nationwide by the Vietnam Social Insurance agency.

However, according to Mr. Do Ngoc Tho, Head of the Policy Implementation Department (Vietnam Social Insurance), this approach has met with resistance from many people who believe that the social insurance agency is making things difficult for citizens, and that the insurance sector has no right to issue documents requiring people to submit reports. Therefore, the proposal for pensioners to periodically confirm their eligibility has been abolished.

According to Mr. Tho, with over 3.3 million pensioners nationwide, managing them presents a challenge. Recently, social insurance agencies in some localities have discovered that some deceased individuals were still receiving pensions and have had to recover both the principal and interest.

To address this issue, Mr. Tran Dung Ha proposed that the current revision of the Social Insurance Law should include a regulation requiring pensioners to contact the social insurance agency or their local authority at least once a year or every six months to verify their information and upload data to the system. This regulation would be similar to requiring workers to report their unemployment status monthly at the employment service center to continue receiving unemployment benefits.

The character's name in Phu Yen has been changed.

Bui Toan - Le Tuyet

Source link: https://vnexpress.net/tra-luong-huu-cho-nguoi-da-chet-4642157.html