By Mohammed Mohammed
The Executive Secretary of the Pension Transition Administration Directorate (PTDA), Dr. Chioma Ejike, on Tuesday launched the pilot phase of the ‘I Am Alive’ App, a web-based software designed to enable pensioners confirm that they are alive through smartphone or computer system.
According to her, the I’Am Alive solution was designed by PTAD with the utmost welfare of pensioners in mind leveraging on accuracy, reliability, user friendliness and convenience.
With the introduction of this technological innovation into the system, Ejikeme, who felt excited, assured that the field verification exercise conducted in 2019 would be the last time PTAD will call out pensioners for field verification.
Test-running the App with pensioners in the presence of Journalists at the Headquarters of PTAD in Abuja, she said the solution takes the pensioners through a 3-step confirmation process that ends with a text message response.
She however, warned: “kindly note that pensioners’ BVN, ATM Card details and ATM PIN are not required for the confirmation process and PTAD warns pensioners to beware of fraudsters.
“The directorate has decided to deploy the application in phases, starting with 50,000 pensioners which cut across the 4 operational departments and the 6 geo-political zones, selected to participate in this pilot scheme.”
Dr. Ejikeme, explained that a major gain of the 2014 and 2019 verification exercises was the reduction of the directorate’s payroll by almost 18% which is the equivalent of about 50,000 pensioners as a result of removal of ineligible pensioners from the payroll.
She said: “20,000 eligible pensioners who were hitherto not on the payroll were enrolled, 18,046 pensioners comprising ex-workers of privatized agencies who had hitherto not been considered for pension were enrolled .
“312 war-affected police officers granted amnesty in the year 2000 were paid their arrears and put on PTAD’s payroll.”