"Loss of 6 billion Euros" at the National Pensions House

So far over 100 thousands of pensioners have filed complaints within courts in order to recover their money they paid for health insurance, after Constitutional Court has decided that only for that part of pension that exceeds 740 lei can be retained the contribution of 5,5 percent.

The specialized lawyers in employment state that the law was misinterpreted and pensioners have big chances to win the trials, but the National Pensions House sustains that it did not make any errors.

In addition, amounts of money will not be paid back, because the Constitutional Court decision is not retroactively applicable, has explained Thursday the president of the National Pensions House , Domnica Doina Pârcălabu.

Domnica Doina Pârcălabu has answered also to the serious accusations of the Court of Auditors, which discovered in its last rapport loss of the National Pensions House of over 6 billion Euros.

6 billion Euros loss from the money for pensions payment, illegal pensions of almost 5 million Euros, over 1600 incompatibility cases and numerous wrong codes –these are the main problems identified after the control made by the Court of Auditors.

The president of the National Pensions House , Domnica Doina Pârcălabu, has declared Thursday that an important part of the problems were already solved.

So, after the measures taken by the representatives of the House, are left only six cases of unsolved incompatibility, for the rest being already established the debits which are ongoing recovery.

As regards the deficit of collected money, the president of the House defended saying that the institution that she leads is not responsible for the effective revenue collection , but the Tax Administration Agency structures.

The House of Pensions contests the rapport

In addition, has specified Domnica Doina Pârcălabu, the House of Pensions has contested certain aspects of the rapport due to some auditor’s procedure errors.

"Those amounts are amounts estimated by the auditors of the Court of Auditors based on the samples. There are focussed samples, have they verified something? No, they made me first filters and determined a sample following a certain aspect."

"And, starting from that sample, they extrapolated at the entire system. Or, this aspect and those amounts are estimated and they are not real", has specified the president of the National Pensions House .

Court’s rapport has emphasized also serious irregularities in payment of invalidity and survivor's pensions, for the purposes of making some of these payments to persons who did not have this right, as well as persons who had even two pension files.

Another problem identified by the Court of Auditors is represented by pensions received by deceased people.

Domnica Pârcălabu has specified in these cases it is about gaps in cooperation between the state’s institutions.

"When a person dies, we have to cease the payment once someone comes and requests the death grant and presents all the documents. We have a very well structured procedure and this is the happiest modality."

"If the person does not request the death grant, the mailman goes and delivers his pension which has to be handed personally. We have clauses in the agreement with the Post. The mailman does this or not", affirms the president of the National Pensions House , Domnica Doina Pârcălabu.

Within the conference, the president of the House has announced that the decision on Thursday of the Constitutional Court influences over 2 million people, and this measure will be applied starting May and it does not have retroactive effect.

Translated by Alexandra-Diana Mircea
MTTLC, Bucharest University