A day at the pension pay office reveals senior citizens’ helplessness and bureaucratic ineptitude
In 2004, Savithri (name changed) lost her husband. A month after his demise, she went to the pension pay office in Egmore to avail of the family pension. It took her more than three months of running around, and several visits to the office from her home which is over 15 kilometres away, to finally get the procedure completed, and to avail of the benefits.
“For someone who has to start afresh, and does not know whom to approach, it was very challenging. I was asked to approach several people, some of whom were unresponsive. By the time I got all the documents and formalities sorted, I was worn out and frustrated,” she recalled, adding that the fact that she could not hear well only added to her distress.
Almost eight years later, little seems to have changed. On a hot Friday morning, frail 60-year old Santhana Mary had arrived to make a thumb impression at the office. When she went to the office on the first floor at 10. 15 a.m., she said she was directed to wait downstairs, where an official would come. Santhana, who could not entirely comprehend the instructions, came out of the building, and settled on an open bench, and waited, almost endlessly, without knowing whom she had to see and where she had to go.
“My husband worked as a watchman, and it is his pension that I am getting now. They said someone will come,” she said. Santhana, who could muster up just enough energy to speak, added that the Rs. 500 pension that she gets is just enough for her monthly expenses. “I borrow money to travel from my son when I have to come,” she said, before she eventually fell asleep on the bench after waiting for an hour in the wrong place.
Among the litany of woes at the office where the youngest people the staff deals with is at least 60 years old, is the waiting time on most days, and the state of the restrooms. The first floor has four restrooms in total, two for men, and two for women, which has to be shared by the staff of the office and the pensioners. All of them are in poor condition.
According to a source, the delays sometimes are inevitable given that the number of staff members were inadequate to handle the increasing number of pensioners each year.
“We spend the first half of the day just attending to enquiries, and get little time to process the applications and procedures which lead to the delay,” he said, adding that they handle close to 1 lakh pension accounts.
He added that some delays recently had also been caused because of a new online programme which had been introduced. “Since it was a new system, some people made errors which we had to correct,” he said.
However, not all pensioners were willing to brand the processes cumbersome, and the office unfriendly. Saraswati K. who worked as a hospital staff member, and has been receiving her pension for 15 years, observed that she had faced absolutely no hassles so far.
“On most days my work gets completed within an hour. If you have all your documents in place, the delay is minimum,” she said.
Keywords: pension, senior citizens woes
when the technology has advanced too far ,i cant understand whats the problem giving pension to the next of the kin ,each and every details are there already and the pensioner would have given the authorisation whom to pay the pension after the demise,only reckless elements in the govt service would delay the payment,thease elements should be brought to book and given due justice,if not suspended for certain period, when they are deprived of their monthly salary they learn their mistakes,in spite of it they are doing this, they should be dissmissed from the service for inefficency shameless creatures.
This is just one instance of how inept most public services are. Instead of making everybody's job easy by ensuring that the right information is conveyed in a proper simple manner and updated constantly, most officials make it difficult by placing a premium on it. Most of the offices do not even have an information desk.
What is need at the government offices is a couple of "May I help You"
counters where responsible people attend to the visitors. And proper
display of information / documents needed for processing various types
of requests.
If these two are complied with, I am sure the waiting time and
frustration level can be reduced drastically. This is simple common
sense, easily implementable - but if these things are not done if
speaks volumes about vested interests who are not allowing such simple
things to be implemented.
Disgusting that old people are harassed by corrupt and inefficient staff. Hope these guys will face 100times more suffering after their retirement...
The Picture sums it up! Excellent photograph by Vedhan. This is been the case of Pension Pay Office since ages. Don't understand how the employees working in the office (most of the govt offices) are so less efficient. “Since it was a new system, some people made errors which we had to correct”. Hope people would'nt get offended if a surgeon or an advocate come up with such explanations. The common man should raise against all these atrocities. Thanks to a neutral media like "The Hindu" for raising these issues which, majority of the people do not even notice.
An hour each time after receiving the pension for 15 years is in itself a disgrace by international standards let alone 3 months.
It is unfortunate that we set ourselves such low standards that we don't understand what is good and what is bureaucracy nightmare.
And the first half a day they spend tending to enquiries can be cut down significantly by having relevant information pamphlets with simple instructions.
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