Lawyers slam RAF over direct payments system
The Law Society of South Africa (LSSA) has warned the Road Accident Fund (RAF) that excluding attorneys in favour of a direct payments system to motor vehicle accident claimants it will effectively deny injured road accident victims access to justice.
Also, the practical problems in implementing such an electronic system by the RAF, which falls under the Department of Transport, could mirror the recent electronic licensing debacle under the eNatTiS system implementation. The RAF recently advertised its intentions to pay claimants direct by calling on current and new claimants to provide the RAF with their banking details. LSSA Chief Executive Officer, Raj Daya, says: The banking details of some 400 000 old and current claims need to be captured and verified in terms of Financial Intelligence Centre legislation. This excludes the numerous new claims lodged every day. Many claimants, particularly illiterate or unsophisticated claimants, may not even have bank accounts. According to Daya, injured claimants will be left to the mercy of the faceless RAF bureaucracy. Not only will this involve claimants having to find their way around the current system, but also the morass of the new system which the RAF intends to implement. Press release on the Legalbrief Today site