Hundreds of employees queued at the Momentum Retirement Administrator offices in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, to claim a portion of their retirement funds as the two-pot system kicked in on Sunday. However, there was a forced evacuation due to a "health and safety scare." Momentum's Thinus Alsworth-Elvey said payments would be made after 21 days.

FINANCIAL RELIEF

A woman who refused to be named explained that she understands the long-term effects of the two-pot system but urgently needs her money. "I have four children and a part of my house was blown away by strong winds in Lawley and we've been using two rooms. I really have no other option but to do this. This decision by the government came at the right time and the money will give me a chance to fix my house and pay off all lingering debt and I can start afresh," she said.

USE YOUR OPTIONS TO MAKE THE CLAIM

Alsworth-Elvey, an administrator at Momentum Retirement Administrators, said that since the two-pot system became active, they've received a large turnout of people at their offices. "Before midday, we had managed to process around 300 claims. We have snaking queues, but we did make it known to our clients that they can apply for their claims online. However, as you can see, people prefer coming to process their claims manually. We printed forms and handed them over to people so they could fill them in while they queue," he said. He explained that they had a health scare, and this caused a delay. "The offices are not ours; they are rented, so we had a health scare in the building and had to pause our services for a while," he said. Alsworth-Elvey also encouraged employees to use the online system to avoid long queues.

The two-pot retirement system enables anyone who has a pension fund, provident fund, retirement annuity or preservation fund to access a small portion of their retirement savings before you retire for emergencies. The withdrawal is subject to tax.