That is according to Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber’s response to a Parliamentary question about the adjusted fee structure.
“The expected revenue from this fee increase was projected to be R2.3 billion annually. R2 billion for online verification and R300 million from bulk verification services,” Schreiber said.
“The proposal is currently open for public consultation. Should the fee structure change following the public consultation process, the projection will also change.”
Schreiber’s feedback comes after Home Affairs rolled out a comprehensive upgrade to the digital verification system, which it says will significantly improve its efficiency.
The system enables government departments to verify client identities against the National Population Register using biometric features and will allow businesses in the financial sector to do the same.
Home Affairs said that the fees for the private sector to use the system will increase for the first time in over a decade.
However, public sector users, including government departments and agencies, are unaffected by the fee changes as government users are exempt from the charges.
Upon announcing the proposed fees, the department said this would allow it to balance the need to invest in the National Population Register while not negatively affecting public finances.
According to a recent notice published in the Government Gazette, the new fees are as follows:
Institution New fee
Any person or institution on behalf of, or on the written instruction of, any such person R10 per transaction
Any state department, municipality, or statutory body No fee
Any organisation, body, or institution whose main activity is insurance or banking R5,000 for 5,000 transactions or part thereof, and R10 per transaction
Any other organisation, body, society, or institution R5,000 for 5,000 transactions or portion thereof, and R10 per transaction
Upgrading the system
In his response, Schreiber said the system had previously been “plagued by problems,” with an error rate of 50% and delays of up to 24 hours.
Home Affairs previously described issues where the system would routinely take 24 hours to respond, and when it finally did, the responses were littered with errors requiring manual verification.
However, Schreiber says that, in addition to the initial upgrade, the fee increase will help strengthen the system over time through continued investment.
“Ongoing reforms will dramatically improve the quality of the department’s digital verification service,” Schreiber said.
“It will also raise the required funding to invest in a stronger, more secure and more effective Population Register.”
The upgraded system will help to reduce waiting times when clients require identity verification to obtain a social grant or open a bank account, Schreiber said in a separate comment.
He added that when the system is impaired, as it has been in the past, it negatively affects the ability of banks, insurance companies, and other financial service providers to verify clients and conduct business.
The minister said that this investment in the population register was overdue and an essential step in delivering on the vision of a digital identity system for South Africa.
President Cyril Ramaphosa recently also announced the country’s plans to invest in digital infrastructure to expand government service access during his State of the Nation Address in February 2025.
He said the changes would include revamping the gov.za platform and launching a digital identity system.
Ramaphosa added that the digital infrastructure investments would bolster the relationship between citizens and government while making government services “accessible to every person at a touch”.