SSNIT extends deadline for Ghana Card merger

From July 1, 2022, the Ghana Card will be the only identification card recognised by the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), the Management of the Trust has said.

This follows an extension of the deadline for Members of the Scheme to merge their SSNIT and Personal ID Numbers on their Ghana Cards from 31st December, 2021 to 30th June, 2022.

This is in compliance with Regulation 7 (1) of the National Identity Register Regulations, 2012, L.I. 2111,” a statement issued by the Management of SSNIT, and shared with the Ghana News Agency, said.

The Regulation, it said, required the use of the Ghana Card as identification for “transactions pertaining to individuals in respect of pensions” and “transactions that have social security implications”.

The Trust said the integration of the databases of the two institutions would save SSNIT US$ 17 million for halting the printing of new biometric cards to its members.

It said previously, SSNIT incurred a cost of seven dollars per printing a biometric card for a member.

The Trust explained that upon merging its database with NIA, it would only spend 60 pesewas per person and thus, incur a total cost of three million cedis for enrolling 30 million of its members onto the NIA database.

It, therefore, urged members who were yet to register for their Ghana Cards to do so in order to merge their SSNIT and NIA numbers before June 30 deadline.

“Employers are to note that they will be required to use only the NIA numbers of their workers to process Contribution Reports and make payments. Voluntary contributors will also have to pay their contributions using their NIA numbers,” it said.

As part of the government’s plan to migrate all identification numbers onto the National Identification Card, also known as Ghana Card, the Management of SSNIT on June 28, 2021, began processes to merge all SSNIT numbers to the Ghana card.