DESPITE improvements in the delivery of social services, the lament of one Belmont woman suggests that some groups are still made to suffer as a result of bureaucratic mix-ups and uncaring public officers.

Elizabeth Fergus complained to TnT Mirror recently that her elderly mother was given quite a run around when she went to collect her first pension cheque last September.

Staff at the TTPost Office said that the cheque simply wasn’t there. Fergus then accompanied her mother to the Ministry of Social Development’s Office in Aranguez, where they learned that the cheque was sent to TTPost since July 2005.

They revisited TTPost, only to be told that the cheque was dropped off at the post office, but was returned on August 23, when no one came to collect it.

Fergus said: “We went to Social Welfare (Social Development Ministry’s office in Port of Spain) and my mother told them she did not receive the cheque.

“She was told to call the Aranguez office within three weeks to find out if she could collect it.”

Fergus complained that she had been going around in circles, with officers at Aranguez referring her to the head office in Port of Spain and officers at Port of Spain telling her she must go to Aranguez.

Concerned that the cheque would be stale-dated by December, Fergus persisted, and eventually learned that there was an error on the cheque, which was corrected and sent to TT Post on October 28.

Officers at the Aranguez office mistakenly thought that the cheque was returned because the payee was deceased.

On November 9, the cheque still wasn’t available but Fergus was told it would be by the end of that week (November 11).

On November 14, she was told that the officer handling her matter was not available, and that no one else would be able to provide information or locate the cheque.

A week later, and after three months of going backward and forward between Port of Spain, Aranguez and TT Post’s offices, Fergus’ mother collected her first pension cheque.

While she is happy, Fergus feels that the elderly should not be made to experience so much anxiety, especially those who don’t have others to do the running around for them.