IKA a threat to pension system
The Social Security Foundation (IKA) is the social security system’s ball and chain, as just a couple of months before its incorporation into the new Single Social Security Entity (EFKA), its employees are warning about the levels of its revenues and payouts.
Giorgos Kyriakopoulos, the head of the IKA workers’ union, told a conference on Wednesday that the social security system is turning into a setup of doubtful social efficiency, as the Labor Ministry’s law has led to a major cut in new pensions, while in some cases, such as widows’ pensions, it is little more than a token gesture, given that they do not exceed 150 euros.
Privy to insider information on all the system’s problems, the head of the IKA union issued a stark warning about EFKA, estimating that on January 1, problems in completing the process for the single entity will turn transactions with the new hyper-fund into a nightmare both for its employees and the people insured in it.
Regarding widows’ pensions, although the necessary circular has not yet been published by the ministry, leaving at least 6,400 such benefits up in the air, they will be dramatically slashed when they are finally issued, as against the minimum level of 430 euros per month their new amount will be just 150 euros.
IKA workers also revealed during Wednesday’s conference that many decisions for the issue of pensions are recorded with pen and paper rather than online.
They also stressed that, to date, no circular has been released for the calculation of pensions according to the new law (No 4387 of 2016), so that many of the 9,990 applications for pensions submitted within this year cannot be issued.
The number of pending decisions at IKA concerns 60,493 main pensions (including 10,130 disability pensions and 9,023 widows’ pensions) and 61,654 auxiliary pensions. IKA will end the year with a deficit of more than 800 million euros, while it also owes 1.1 billion euros to the Healthcare Service Provision Organization (EOPYY) and a similar amount to the Manpower Organization (OAED).
