The Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority will begin to recover payments mistakenly made to 2,300 MPF accounts by the end of this month. People whose pension accounts were wrongly topped up with a HK$6,000 government handout aimed at low-income workers will receive written notification this week about the withdrawals. Authority chief operating officer Hendena Yu Hoi-ping told legislators yesterday that those affected would have three weeks to object to the withdrawals. Late last month, the authority disclosed that HK$13.8 million had been wrongly paid into 2,300 MPF accounts. A one-off giveaway of HK$9 billion was aimed at 1.4 million workers whose monthly income was less than HK$10,000. The mistaken payments were made into the accounts of people who earned more than HK$10,000 a month. The authority said earlier that the mistakes were due to inaccurate salary records submitted by employers and MPF trustees. But Civic Party lawmaker Ronny Tong Ka-wah expressed concern at a meeting of the Legislative Council financial affairs panel over reports of people with incomes over the scheme's limit being entitled to the one-off payments. In the early stages of the payment process, which began in March, some people with monthly incomes of more than HK$10,000 were found to be entitled to the government's special contribution. The authority said those people were eligible because they had changed jobs during the period. 'How many people are eligible in principle but in fact their cases violate the original intent of the policy?' asked Mr Tong. 'Will the government take back the money?' Patrick Ho Chung-kei, assistant secretary for financial services and the treasury, indicated that the government would not initiate a claim for such payments. 'Upon completion of the [cash] injection, the concerned people can voluntarily state that they do not need the payments and we will follow an established mechanism to withdraw the money,' Mr Ho said. Last week the authority's special hotline on government handouts received 1,300 inquiries from people who considered themselves eligible but had not received payments. Another 300 people inquired about payments that they thought might be mistakes.
