HSE blames applicants for back to school delays

HSE blames applicants for back to school delays


Rowan Gallagher

HSE West will be drafting in new staff in Mayo to deal with a backlog in the Back to Schools Clothing and Allowance applications while it appears they are cutting frontline staff in Mayo General Hospital.
The backlog has left more than half of the applicants in the Mayo, Galway, Roscommon area without their entitlement the week before many children are due to go back to school.
The turnaround time for applications is between seven to 30 days in Mayo with nearly half of families that applied having not received their entitlements yet.
14,500 forms have been received in the Mayo, Galway, Roscommon area with only 6,858 of these having been paid out.
The HSE West blames the applicants themselves and told The Mayo News that the backlog was created because applications were incomplete or missing vital documents.
“Further extra resources have been deployed in HSE West to deal with the significant increase in applications and it is hoped that up to 8,000 applications will be processed in the coming week. There are considerable delays because of incomplete applications, or applications without critical documentation, which require further correspondence with applicants,” a HSE West spokesperson told The Mayo News.
Fine Gael, Deputy Michael Ring warned that the delay is leaving many families without much needed assistance during an expensive period.
“Community Welfare Officers warned the Government back in January that they needed more resources to run the Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance Scheme. Extra temporary posts have now been provided – but they have come too late for many families.
“The net result is that large numbers of families won’t have received the Allowance when the school year begins,” Deputy Ring concluded
The turnaround time in Dublin has received a boost in the last week with turnaround times improving from nine days to three-five days, however, the Mayo figures appear to have gotten worse. On the week ending August 13 the turnaround time in Mayo was eleven or more days and has since been changed to the seven to 30 day mark just last week.
A total of €58,805,144 has already been paid out according to the HSE with €3,865,691 being paid out in the Mayo, Galway, Roscommon area though this figure is set to rise significantly within the next 30 days.
Nationally some 40,000 applications have yet to be paid accounting for 25% of the total applications.
Over 100 temporary staff will be cut in Mayo General Hospital in September, Castlebar Independent Councillor Michael Kilcoyne told The Mayo News last week.

For information on the status of your application call the HSE County Clinic in Castlebar on 1890 253152.