Some workers are said to be rushing to the offices of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) to change their ages as they draw closer to retirement.
This practice is attributed to the lack of preparedness for and the fear of retirement by such workers.
The Director of Regulations of the National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA), Mr Ernest Amartey-Vondee, who made this known, cited an instance when twins presented different ages for their pension.
He said the age presented by one of the twins was four years younger than that presented by his twin brother.
Even though Mr Amartey-Vondee could not be specific on the frequency of the practice, he was emphatic that “it is quite common”.
“It normally happens with people who haven’t put in enough preparations towards their retirement,” he told the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday after a press briefing on the 4th National Financial Literacy Week.
Age Assessment Committee
Mr Amartey-Vondee said when retirement suddenly dawned on workers who were not prepared for it, they could not contend with the fact that they would not be getting the kind of income they expected during retirement.
“So they come back to SSNIT and say that their employers recorded the wrong dates of birth and so on and so they want that to be reviewed,” he said.
He said when such claims were made, SSNIT, through its Age Assessment Committee, looked at the circumstances of the situation to determine the correctness or otherwise of the claims.
Financial Week
The National Financial Literacy Week was instituted in 2008 with the view to presenting the full range of the country’s financial services to the public to enable them to make good choices and decisions on financial matters.
This year’s celebration is scheduled to kick off on the theme: “Financial literacy: Key to a secured future” from September 23 to 28, 2014.
The target audience for the celebration is the youth, especially those in tertiary institutions, with officials of the four main regulators of the financial sector – the NPRA, the Bank of Ghana, the National Insurance Commission and the Securities and Exchanges Commission – ready to engage the youth in a detailed programme of activities.
Outcomes
A Deputy Minister of Finance, Mrs Mona Quartey, who briefed the media, said the celebration of the National Financial Literacy Week was expected to ensure behavioural change among financial service providers and consumers to improve financial intermediation in the domestic economy.
She urged the youth to participate in the programmes and take full advantage of the opportunities they offered.
Source: Graphic Online