• Around 1 500 maintenance recipients were left empty-handed after a new payment system crashed.
• Recipients in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal were most affected.
• Deputy Justice Minister John Jeffrey said he viewed the matter in an extremely serious light.

Around 1 500 court maintenance recipients were left without their benefits after a new payment system crashed, according to the justice and constitutional development department. 

Deputy Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development John Jeffery conducted a ministerial oversight visit in East London on Friday.

"Many households rely heavily on maintenance benefits in order to survive, especially at a time when the impact of Covid-19 is making people even more vulnerable to hardship. We must ensure that people receive their maintenance benefits and receive them timely," he said.

"No person should be left without their maintenance. We view this matter in an extremely serious light and we are monitoring progress closely."

The MojaPay system, which is used for the payment and receipt of maintenance, crashed on the evening of 4 May 2020.

"All provinces were affected by the crash, with the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal more severely affected as the disruption was exacerbated by the migration from the old payment system, known as the JDAS, to the new MojaPay system.

"The closure of the JDAS system was due to an earlier decision, taken by the department, that all beneficiaries who were not on direct payments would be migrated to MojaPay by 31 March 2020," said department spokesperson Chrispin Phiri.

He added that certain courts had not been able to migrate the beneficiaries' data to MojaPay by that date, but the old JDAS system was nonetheless still closed in the Eastern Cape and in KZN, despite the fact that not all courts in these provinces had been successfully migrated to the MojaPay system.

Closure

"The subsequent closure of the JDAS system thus interrupted the processing of payments for some courts. In the Eastern Cape, the crash affected 622 maintenance beneficiaries, whereas in KZN 47 beneficiaries were affected as at the end of June 2020.

"In total, approximately 1 500 beneficiaries were affected as from 1 April. The IT crash has since been resolved and the department has been making daily payments to beneficiaries since 12 May. For the past three months, some 90 898 payments were made for all regions," said Phiri.

The department deployed additionally dedicated capacity at its national office to assist the Eastern Cape region to process payments.

The national office subsequently cleared and assisted the Eastern Cape to effect payments, with 354 payments made in May, 1 552 payments made in June, 431 payments in July, and 125 payments as at 19 August, for the month of August.

Phiri said revised payment procedures were implemented and the region succeeded in reducing payments in the legacy system from 9 986 in December 2019 to 422 in July 2020.

The justice department has promised to ensure a smooth flow of maintenance money in all courts, especially in the East London and Makhanda areas.