A single parent who had planned to apply for a loan to buy presents and goodies to make this Christmas a special one for his children is now faced with the sad prospect of being rejected.
The father, an estate constable attached to the National Maintenance Training and Security Company Limited (MTS), is blaming his predicament on his company.
Like many of his co-workers, the father has an agreement with his company to deduct any loan and/or mortgage instalments or any other deductions from his salary before it is sent to the bank and transfer the payments to the respective institutions. The workers are paid fortnightly.
However, the workers are complaining that for the past four fortnights the company has not paid the instalments.
“Our payslips are showing that the deductions are being made, but MTS is not sending the money to the institutions. So what they doing with our money?” the officer asked.
As a result, the workers have been incurring arrears and bad credit ratings.
An employee complained, “This is not the first time the company did this. Earlier this year for six fortnights our instalments were not paid, even though our payslips showed that the deductions were made. MTS eventually paid the instalments, but not the arrears.”
“The thing about it is that the company not even talking to us about this. We found out after the institutions started calling us. People have loans in the credit union and the banks, people have HDC instalments and now we cannot even get Christmas loans. This is not right and it is not fair,” another worker said.
When contacted on the issue, MTS corporate communication’s manager Adrian Raymond said the company continues to pay workers’ salaries, despite financial difficulties, and will be paying all outstanding deductions.
In a release, Raymond said, “MTS, like many organisations, has been forced to take stringent measures to manage its cash flow in light of late payments from several of its clients. The delay in the servicing of deductions was an absolute last resort action and is not at all the normal practice of the organisation.”
He said the company is in constant communication with several financial institutions to keep them principals aware of “temporary situation” as a means of ensuring some level of comfort to employees.
“Management is steadfastly working to ensure that there is a swift resolution to this issue and is committed to paying all outstanding deductions in the shortest possible time period. All outstanding deductions must and will be paid,” he said, adding the company has been communicating with employees to keep them updated and to give them the assurance the matter is receiving priority attention.