The Government Institutions Pension Fund (GIPF) strives to be a leading pension Fund globally. That is our vision for the next five years. We remain committed to adopt global best practices.
In the past five years, GIPF has indeed evolved with great transformation from the execution of a rebranding exercise leading to the birth of the current refreshed corporate image, to the improvement of turnaround times.
With benefits ranging from normal retirement, early retirement, resignation/dismissal, retrenchment, disability, Ill health, funeral and the one benefit that has been receiving close reviews of late which is the death benefit GIPF has really worked towards diminishing the days these benefits are paid out as we are compassionate towards our members in their time of need. Turnaround times have indeed reduced as indicated below;
*Normal retirement – 25 working days (30 working days or more in the past)
*Early retirement – 25 working days (30 working days or more in the past )
*Resignation/dismissal – 25 working days (30 working days or more in the past )
*Retrenchment – 25 working days (30 working days or more in the past)
*Disability/Ill health – 30 working days (30 working days or more in the past)
*Funeral – 24 hours (48 hours or more in the past)
*Death before retirement – 12 months, depending on submission of all relevant documents. We have started to implement a Board decision and strategic deliverable to effect early processing of death benefits within three months and latest 12 months.
*Death after retirement – 30 working days (60 working days in the past)
The Fund acknowledges the tremendous improvement within its operational department but wants to note that we have not reached our ultimate goal yet. It is a journey and not an event. Amidst the strides we have taken to get where we are today, we strive to pay out funeral claims within 12 hours as we know how difficult losing a loved one is. A current interest is the death benefit of which as per the Pension Funds Act 24 of 1956, the turnaround time for a death claim is a twelve (12) month waiting period if everything is submitted.
The Fund is fully aware that waiting for 12 months is not acceptable. The suffering endured during this period cannot be condoned. It is against this background that one of the strategic deliverables is to pay death benefits within three months with a provision to keep a certain portion within the Fund for the untraced beneficiaries. We are working tirelessly to ensure that we are well within the allocated period and it is our wish to see this timeframe decrease so that our grieving beneficiaries maintain their livelihood even in the absence of their breadwinners.
The Fund cannot achieve this on its own, thus we appeal to our members to ensure that your nomination forms are updated and that your beneficiaries relevant documents are in order. I am glad that the draft bill (FIM Bill) that will soon replace the 1956 Pension Fund Act also prescribes processing of death benefits to be done within three (3) months.
In an effort to trace beneficiaries, the Fund has also embarked on an extensive project to reach out to beneficiaries. Taking a step back in time, in 2015 GIPF launched a list of unenrolled children amounting to over 12 000 individuals which was printed and distributed at strategic places such as churches, hospitals and police stations to mention a few at the Annual stakeholders’ Consultative meeting of which this list has significantly reduced to over 1200 Individuals in 2018.
Besides the above mentioned platform to engage members, the Fund also saw the value in strengthening its relations with all stakeholders’ through different segmented platforms such as the Public Relations Engagement, the Member Education programs with Human Resources Practitioners from government and participating institutions, media engagements, as well as targeted meetings with the different institutions and unions. In addition to these engagements the Fund decided to revisit the Annual Gala Dinner and replace it with a regional Consultative meeting similar to the Consultative meetings held in the capital in the beginning of the year.
This stemmed from the realization that the consultative meeting yield better results as it encourages our members to deliberate extensively with the Board of Trustees and Management of the Fund. Swakopmund was home to the first regional engagement of this kind on the 18 October 2018.
In life, change is the only constant and with that the Fund realized that in order to achieve our core vision we need to change how we operate from within to ensure the desired change we want on the outside. The Fund thus recently embarked and launched an immense project called the Business Processing Improvement (BPI) Project to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of processes across the entire service supply chain of the Fund, which has proven to yield positive results such as reduced turnaround times on claims as indicated earlier.
The aim is to go beyond what is currently being done to enhance our processes efficiently as well as to automate them. The Fund has also adopted an extensive member education campaign in the past five years in efforts to minimize unpleasant predicaments such as; an information drive which ran from print advertisements featuring our “Frequently Asked Questions” strip adverts, member education radio campaigns in all vernaculars, printing of unclaimed benefits and unenrolled annuitants booklets that where availed at strategic places as well as the creation of a search engine for unclaimed benefits on our website.
The above mentioned member outreach initiatives where accompanied by open days, trade fair participation as well as roadshows which allowed our “Pension on wheels” Van to go out to remote areas to assist our members that need to travel long distances to get to our services. During this financial year, the Fund will acquire another van to increase and enhance our outreach.
Furthermore, in order to reach our members, the decision was taken to increase the Funds footprint by opening more offices. In this regard, in January of this year, Outapi office was inaugurated and Eenhana office will be opened in the next four months. Besides the above mentioned challenge, the Fund amidst efforts through member education still has problems with the following documentations which hinder timely payouts; out dated nomination forms, delayed vital identification documents such as ID’s and birth certificates of beneficiaries and school letters of children just to name a few.
It is important that in our quest to be efficient, we should still pay to the correct beneficiaries. We would thus like to take this opportunity to appeal to our members to ensure that their nomination forms are always up to date and that their documents and their beneficiaries’ documents are accurate as this may result in delayed payments.
Also, an appeal goes out to Human Resources Practitioners of government departments and our participating institutions, you our media partners in playing the role of a watchdog and assisting us in reaching members beyond our reach, as well as our key strategic stakeholders’ such as our councilors and headmen to mention a few to accord us the relevant support in ensuring timely benefit payments to our beneficiaries.
GIPF strives to live by one of our core values of service excellence by delivering the highest quality of service, (Right, Fast and Humane) to all our stakeholders in an innovative, professional and respectful manner but we cannot achieve this alone.