‘We are doing everything in our power to ensure that the problem is resolved today so that we can start processing May applications immediately.’
Durban – The Unemployment Insurance Fund has apologised to members of the public after a “freak break in its network” affected the capturing of May Covid-19 TERS online applications which led to a delay in payments.
The UIF on Wednesday issued a statement explaining that the system, which had been undergoing a test run since last week, was due to go live on Tuesday, but a damaged fibre link between the UIF’s offices and the State Information and Technology Agency (SITA) halted those plans.
UIF commissioner, Teboho Maruping, apologised.
“We are doing everything in our power to ensure that the problem is resolved today so that we can start processing May applications immediately. The fault of connectivity in Pretoria is due to a damaged fibre cable that links the UIF to the SITA’s data centre,” he said.
Maruping said once the link had been restored, agents would work to catch up on time lost.
“The UIF’s ICT system development team is on standby to ensure that as soon as the connectivity is re-established the system goes live. We have received an avalanche of complaints because of this and we understand how this could be frustrating to our clients and stakeholders. I would like to assure each and every one of those who have been negatively affected that this was beyond our hands but will try to make up,” he said.
He pointed out that over the last two months, there have been a peak in traffic to the UIF site.
“In general we have managed to keep our heads above water under those circumstances and there is no reason why we will not push ourselves to do our utmost to catch up,” he said.
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