SOCIAL INSURANCE FUND AND VTB-ARMENIA BANK DROVE BARGAIN WITH THE DEVIL
Yerevan, August 14. ArmInfo. The State Social Insurance Fund of
Armenia and VTB-Armenia Bank signed a contract shackling the Armenian
pensioners. The new agreement violates the rights of the pensioners
shortening the term of receiving pension payments in VTB-Armenia
bank branches.
Levon Nersesian, director of the ‘Armenian Center for Human
Rights Protection after A. Sakharov’ organization, said to ArmInfo
correspondent that according to the agreement, in case the pensioner
has not received the payment from one of the BTA-Armenia Bank
branches, he/she will not be able to received it sooner than the
next month. Mr. Nersisian said that the new conditions force the
pensioners to refuse ‘free’ bank services and receive their pension
payments through the mediation of social employees. The social
employees usually demand AMD 100-200 or even 500 illegal ‘tax’ per
each visit. ‘Thus the pensioners who avoided the dishonest social
employees became the victims of bank machinations,’ he said.
In its turn the Social Insurance Fund complains that in Armenia there
are more pensioners that economically active citizens. ArmInfo
correspondent found out that indeed Armenia has 539 thousand
pensioners, 105 thousand employers and 450 thousand employees,
regularly paying taxes. Thus, the complaints of the Social Insurance
Fund run contrary to the official statistics provided baby the fund
itself. Moreover, taking into consideration that each social employee
receives illegally AMD 500 from each tenth pensioner, the yearly
shadow circulation of the social sphere makes up $60 thousand.