A man has lost his bid to recover a death benefit of more than R152,000 linked to his late mother’s provident fund after the Financial Services Tribunal found that his complaint was lodged years too late.
The tribunal dismissed Simon Khoza’s application for reconsideration of a Pension Funds Adjudicator decision that had refused to investigate his complaint concerning his mother’s pension benefit.
Mother died in 2007
Khoza’s mother had left her employment in August 2006 and died in July 2007.
According to the ruling, a representative of her former employer had indicated that she had held Group Life Cover and a provident fund that attracted a death benefit. The representative allegedly undertook to assist the family in obtaining payment, but Khoza said this assistance never materialised.
Khoza eventually approached the adjudicator with a complaint about the non-payment of the benefit.
However, the fund said the matter involved historical events stretching from 2007 to 2012 and that certain family members had already received payments between 2007 and 2010, although Khoza was unsure of the exact amounts.
Benefit grows to R152,356
The fund’s records showed that the deceased’s provident fund value was R82,901 in 2007.
By 2012, the amount had grown with interest to R152,356.
A resolution passed in September 2012 authorised the distribution of the amount in equal shares among the deceased’s five children.
Records from July 2012 indicated that the fund was awaiting identity documents and birth certificates from the children before processing the payments.
The fund nevertheless said the scarcity of administrative records made it difficult to establish exactly how the payment resolution had subsequently been executed.
Complaint lodged too late
Khoza’s complaint to the adjudicator was lodged in November 2025, more than a decade after the 2012 resolution concerning the benefit.
The adjudicator found that the complaint was outside the statutory time limit and therefore could not be investigated.
Khoza then approached the Financial Services Tribunal, arguing for reconsideration of the adjudicator’s decision.
The tribunal explained that the relevant legal test required it to establish when the act or omission complained of occurred and when the complainant knew, or could reasonably have known, about it.
Under the Prescription Act, a debt becomes claimable when the creditor can sue and the debtor is obliged to perform. A debt is also not deemed to be due until the creditor has knowledge of the debtor’s identity and the facts giving rise to the debt or could have obtained that information through reasonable care.
Complaint was “well out of time”
The tribunal found that the adjudicator had been incorrect about the precise point at which prescription began to run but said this did not change the outcome.
It found that Khoza’s complaint was “well out of time” and had prescribed.
The tribunal noted that Khoza himself had told the adjudicator that the matter had been lodged with the employer years earlier and that the employer had promised to assist the family. This demonstrated that the relevant issue had been within his knowledge more than three years before he approached the adjudicator.
The tribunal therefore agreed that the adjudicator lacked jurisdiction to investigate the complaint.
Records can’t be kept indefinitely
The tribunal also highlighted the importance of statutory time limits in pension disputes.
It said the limits existed partly to protect fund members because pension funds could not reasonably be expected to retain records indefinitely.
Requiring the fund to make a payment years later when records were no longer available could prejudice existing members and would be unfair, the Tribunal said.
Khoza’s application for reconsideration was accordingly dismissed.
