THE DEPARTMENT of Social and Family Affairs is checking the records of thousands of Irish pensioners living abroad following concerns that welfare payments are being made to people who have died, writes Carl O'Brien, Social Affairs Correspondent
A total of 35,000 recipients of the contributory pension are living outside the State, mainly in the UK, US and Canada.
However, these countries do not automatically alert Irish authorities once an Irish citizen has died.
The Irish Timeshas learned that department officials are trying to contact at least 8,000 recipients of the contributory pension whom they suspect may have passed away or who may no longer have an adult dependent.
The State contributory pension is €223 per week, and more if the recipient has an adult dependent, or "qualified adult".
The first phase of the "life certification project" began last month when about 1,000 circulars were issued to pensioners.
If there is no response within a period of time, officials say payments will be suspended.
However, they have stressed that it will be possible to reinstate pension payments for anyone who is wrongly taken off the list of eligible recipients.
It is understood that the control exercise - being directed from a social welfare office in Sligo - is focused initially on some of the oldest pension recipients.
The Government's contributory State pension is a social insurance payment made to people aged 66 or over, based on the person's social insurance (PRSI) contributions.
A total of 237,000 people are in receipt of this pension, 14 per cent of whom are resident abroad.
The issue of pensions payments being made wrongly to deceased people has rarely been a problem in Ireland as any deaths in the State are automatically notified to social welfare authorities.
A spokeswoman for Minister for Social and Family Affairs Martin Cullen yesterday confirmed that the life certification exercise began last month.
She said it was one of a number of control measures under way to ensure errors or irregular payments were kept to a minimum.
Mr Cullen told an Oireachtas committee last month that 600 staff were engaged in helping to prevent errors and fraudulent payments across 50 different social welfare schemes.
Officials conducted 345,000 welfare reviews of individuals last year on a regular and targeted basis.
These included 70,000 people in receipt of the job seekers' allowance, 43,000 lone parents and 16,000 recipients of child benefit.
A further 126,000 reviews were undertaken by the department's medical referees.