The South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) explained that more than half of the people who applied for the R350 grant were rejected from receiving payment.
The high number of rejected grant applications was in large part due to a change in the R350 grant requirements along with a lower number of total applications.
During the R350 grant's first iteration, the income threshold was R595. However, Sassa did not have the budget to pay all the people who previously benefited from the grant and lowered the income threshold to R350 in April 2022.
This change meant that less people would qualify for the grant. However, Sassa will now look to increase the income threshold to the food poverty line in the hope that more people will qualify for the R350 grant.
Executive Manager for Grants, Brenton Van Vrede said the lower number of applications received by Sassa could be due to the lower income threshold while other previous beneficiaries may not have submitted applications after realising they would no longer qualify for the grant.
Sassa hopes that by moving the R350 grant income threshold to R624, at least 10 million people will qualify and be paid the R350 grant. Van Vrede adds that if the department sees that less than 10 million applications are received, they might consider raising the threshold even more.
Draft regulations were proposed by Social Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu earlier this month which is currently going through a public comment process. This is the formal process before publishing the final regulations with the new income threshold.