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# Welfare Payments
An Post wins new contract to keep delivering social welfare payments
The department say that the contract is worth more than €50 million a year to An Post.
AN POST WILL deliver cash payments for the Department of Social Protection for at least the next two years and possibly up to six after a new deal was signed.
The department say that the contract is worth more than €50 million a year to An Post and was signed as a result of a competitive tender process.
It is estimated that as part of the deal An Post will deliver of €9 billion worth of payments to welfare customers next year involving more than 40 million transactions.
The Minister for Social Protection Joan Burton TD says that the contract provides certainty for the over 50 per cent of welfare customers who are paid in cash at local posts offices.
“This money represents almost 20 per cent of Government day-to-day spending, showing the significance of this hugely important contract,” she said.
The department is moving through a phase of significant transformation. The transformation of our local welfare offices into Intreo Centres is key to delivering more modern, efficient and dynamic services to our customers and providing value for taxpayers and the economy.
An Post chief executive Donal Connell has pledged that the company will “continue to innovate and invest in next generation systems and products” after he signed the deal with the department.
The contract contains the option to extend the initial two-year deal for one or more periods of up to 12 months each, up to a maximum of 6 years in total.
Read: Over 141,000 social welfare applications rejected in 2013 >
Read: Social housing waiting list falls to almost 90,000 households >
Read: Social welfare payments delayed by one day, affecting 32,700 people >
