Sunday Times Daily reports that the Office of the Pension Funds Adjudicator (OPFA) has taken a firm stance against employers that fiddled with provident fund contributions during a Covid concession period. The Private Security Sector Provident Fund amended its rules to allow employers to pay contributions at a lower rate (5%) from September 2021 to March 2023. In a statement on Tuesday, adjudicator Muvhango Lukhaimane said, however, that some opportunistic employers had been deducting higher amounts from employee salaries while remitting a lower amount to the fund. Others had continued to remit the lower rate even after the concession period had passed.

Lukhaimane, in considering one complaint, ordered Bamogale Enterprise to pay the fund all the arrear contributions, including interest, as computed by the fund. This after finding that it had deducted a higher amount from one employee’s salary, while paying a lower amount to the fund. Lukhaimane reported that the employee concerned, after checking his contribution statement, had noticed that the company had deducted R342.53 from his salary but had only contributed R228.35 to the fund. The OPFA is a statutory body established to investigate and determine complaints of abuse of power, maladministration, disputes of fact or law and employer dereliction of duty in respect of pension funds.

by Tania Broughton
Ref: SA Labour News