TSC to Process Teachers Pensions Within 6 Months, Ministry Instructs
Education Cabinet Secretary Ezekiel Machogu has announced that it will now take less than six months to process pensions for retired educators.
Mr. Machogu told the Senate on August 9, 2023, that his ministry has instructed the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) to promptly process and submit a teacher’s file to the Pensions Department of the National Treasury upon retirement.
Afterwards, he indicated, the processing of the payment of the obligations would take between four and five months.
Mr. Machogu stated, “We have requested that the file be sent as soon as a teacher retires so that the payment process can begin.”
“It is prudent that they [retired teachers] receive their compensation quickly. We insist that the procedure takes four to five months.”
The CS was responding to a query from Senator Alexander Mundigi of Embu, who wished to know why retired teachers had to wait more than two years to receive their pension benefits.
The lawmaker noted that other public-sector retirees received their pensions within three months.
Mr. Mundigi raised the question of why teachers experience difficulties accessing their pensions and proposed collaboration between the Education Ministry and the National Treasury to ensure timely pension disbursement.
He remarked that it is unacceptable for individuals who previously received a regular monthly salary to face a delay of over two years in receiving their pensions.
Mr. Machogu assured Mr. Mundigi that the current administration’s new plan to expedite the process would end the lengthy wait for teachers’ pension contributions.
The CS urged retired teachers whose retirement benefits were delayed for more than a year to contact the ministry. The CS remarked that if there were instances of such cases, they should be sent to the ministry for appropriate action.
In May, TSC CEO Nancy Macharia blamed the National Treasury for delays in the payment of pensions to retired teachers, stating that the TSC had always submitted the required documentation to the Treasury on time.
According to her, TSC only requires three months to process documents for submission to Treasury, which delays payment processing.
In addition, Ms. Macharia explained that the commission gives teachers who are approaching retirement one year’s notice to prepare their documentation for compensation in preparation for their exit.
Ms. Macharia appeared before the Education Committee of the Senate to explain the excessive delays in paying pension claims to approximately 23,487 teachers who retired between 1998 and 2003.
This was in response to a petition led by a former educator who claimed the TSC had not paid retirees 20 years after they departed the service.
The TSC director did point out that a number of factors, including delays in obtaining the necessary documentation from retirees and instances in which retirees and beneficiaries are slow to submit documents for processing in order to release payments, can cause delays.
TSC to Process Teachers Pensions Within 6 Months, Ministry Instructs