By Ragheema Mclean

The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) has said in recent weeks that they are working on disbursing outstanding allowances as many students have been left destitute after not receiving their allowances for 2023.

NSFAS is yet to pay around 20 000 students their allowances with the financial aid scheme explaining, “These unresolved cases of disbursements requires further input and consultation with institutions”.

According to the bursary scheme the process of reconciling NSFAS allowances is being divided into three parts: direct payment of allowances to students; allowances paid to institutions for tuition and allowances paid to students through institutions.

NSFAS says it aims to have all outstanding allowances for 2023 paid by 15 January 2024 to ensure that the disbursement of 2024 allowances are not affected by these outstanding allowance payments.

Speaking on VOC Breakfast on Wednesday, NSFAS Spokesperson, Ishmael Mnisi said one of the main reasons behind the delay in disbursements is that the scheme is currently facing data management challenges.

He explained: “Getting the data from institutions to NSFAS remain a challenge and particularly because of the changes that place during the year. For example, some students may have deregistered.”

“Other changes could also include when students change their courses without updating NSFAS.”

“Also, cases where students are changing their residences.”

“We need to first verify all these changes with institutions before we can make payments.”

Mnisi stated that students whose allowances have not been paid should contact or visit their institutions as the bursary scheme will be communication with universities and colleges.

Alternatively, Students can also contact the NSFAS call centres or log any queries via their myNSFAS account.

Meanwhile, Mnisi said many students do not comply with notifications and messages they send when certain information needed is missing to finalise students’ allowance payments.

“When it comes to the time when allowances must be paid out, they come and raise concerns that they haven’t received their money when they didn’t finalise information on their side.”

Furthermore, regarding budget adjustments Mnisi said the NSFAS does anticipate budget cuts that will subsequently affect its funding budget.

This comes after Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana announced budget cuts to several government departments, entities, and provinces last year.

However, he said NSFAS is hopeful that the reductions won’t necessitate a significant decrease in the number of students currently receiving funding.

Currently the bursary scheme funds around 1 million students studying at universities and TVET colleges across the county.

VOC News

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