Saturday, May 3, 2014

SPF attracts more contributors with its voluntary members' programme

By Prosper Makene

Public Sector Pension Fund (PSPF)
The Public Sector Pension Fund (PSPF) has recorded an unprecedented number of voluntary contributors to the fund after it introduced a system of accepting voluntary members last year.


Speaking yesterday in Dar es Salaam where the World Day on Safety and Health to Workers was marked, the fund’s operations officer, Lule Madembwe said PSPF has managed to attract 30,000 new contributors through the voluntary contribution programme. The number is beyond the fund’s target of 18,000 contributors for one year.

Madembwe also said that they considered such a high speed from the public to their new system as a big and positive response.

“Many Tanzanians are not well motivated to voluntarily save money in social security funds for their future, but the PSPF has managed to lure workers and businesspeople from both formal and informal sector to join it,” he said.

He underscored that this year the Fund aims at generally increasing the number of its customers by 20,000 in order to reach a total of over 400,000 by end of this year from the current total number of about 380,000 customers.

“Voluntary contribution is another form of membership whereby the other system implies that an employee is mandated to contribute from their salaries,” he said.

Expressing hope to achieving the target, he said so far the fund has registered 23,000 new customers during the past four months.

“We hope that by the end of this year we can manage even to surpass the targets we have put. Our target is to register over 40,000 members,” he said.
He added: “By the end of last year, the fund was worth 1.2trn/- and once we increase the number of the customers, it is expected that by the end of this year the amount will shoot up”.

He allayed fears among the workers over delays in acquiring their retirement benefits, noting that a retiree who is a member of the PSPF will now receive their benefits within one week after submitting the required documents. 
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN

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