Social benefits of public servants to be placed on their bank accounts

YEREVAN, September 15. / ARKA /. Beginning from this year the money allocated to public servants as part of a benefit package for their medical insurance, education and recreation as well as subsidizing mortgage loans borrowed from commercial banks, will be placed on special savings bank accounts, finance minister Vache Gabrielyan said today.

The benefits package was enforced from January 2012 for public servants working in culture, education and social security sectors. The amount of an annual benefit is 132,000 drams.

"From now on if a benefit is not used by the servant, it will not be returned to the budget, as was earlier, but will remain on the account, "Gabrielyan said.

The minister said the government has already concluded agreements with 11 major Armenian banks.

"The funds will be transferred monthly in the amount of 11,000 drams. Moreover, the beneficiaries may use different banking services, receive interest and so on,” he said. The minister called on public servants eligible to the benefits to open bank accounts. According to the minister, the number of public servants eligible to the assistance has grown this year by 30,000 to 150,000.

He said some changes were made to revise and expand the services in respect to medical insurance. "We tired to simplify the mechanism and make it more transparent to place the bulk of paper work on insurance companies", he added.

The government says the goal of this program costing 18 billion drams is to make public service more attractive and help pubic servants to meet some of their needs. ($1 – 406.6 drams). -0-