After six months of implementation of the GESS, hundreds and maybe thousands of beneficiaries still do not have access to health services due to technical problems in the OAY software. These are cases of beneficiaries who normally pay their contributions from last March, as is the case with all beneficiaries, but they can not register in the GESS and have access to health services because their software is not updated by Social Security . The problem has been known to OAU since the first days of system implementation, but so far it has not been resolved.
OAA officials in the complaints of the beneficiaries answer that it is a matter of days to solve the problem, however, this excuse is repeated from month to month, so far no solution has been found. The last assurance is that the problem will be resolved within December.
Many beneficiaries, even though they pay their dues and should have access to personal and specialist doctors and receive their medical care as required by law, are forced to turn to private doctors, pay exorbitant amounts and buy their own medicines. The problem is now getting bigger, as many of the beneficiaries can no longer afford the costs of medical care. The outrage in this case is that while the Health Insurance Organization knows and acknowledges the problem, it does not take responsibility for the beneficiaries, in order to offer them alternative solutions.
The exclusion of beneficiaries from access to the GESS is done because at some point they either stopped paying social security, or because they remained unemployed, or because they changed employer. The problem primarily concerns beneficiaries who do not have Cypriot citizenship, regardless of whether they are registered for 10 or 20 years in Social Insurance and pay contributions.
Source: politis