Pretoria - The Department of Home Affairs has activated its Alive Status Verification service to enable South Africans to check their status to ensure that they have not been fraudulently declared dead on the population register.
This as part of the department's Track&Trace system for ID status verification - a self-help service, which makes it easier for citizens to interact with the department without visiting its offices.
.The Alive Status Verification is the fourth self-help service run on the Department's Track&Trace system that can also be used to track ID books and passport applications and verify a persons' marriage status.
Citizens can either use the department's website or SMS to verify their alive or deceased status.
Those who have access to the internet can visit the department's website www.dha.gov.za and click on Check your Status (at the top left corner of the Homepage) and Choose ID status verification (Alive/Deceased).
"They will be required to enter their ID number and press the Verify button to see if they are 'alive' or 'deceased'," the department said.
People can also use their mobiles using the SMS service; by typing the letter L, followed by their ID number to 32551.
"An SMS will be sent to confirm their status as either 'alive' or 'deceased'. Each SMS costs R1 by all network service providers.
The two options are also supported by the department's call centre number 0800 60 11 90 through which clients can call in to find out about their Alive or Deceased status.
If South Africans find that their status is incorrect, they should visit their local Home Affairs office with an affidavit.
"In an event that a person is registered as 'deceased' when still alive, he or she must report to a local Home Affairs office with an affidavit, obtained from a police station, confirming that they are still alive," the department said.
The department will, on submission of an affidavit as proof of their status, ask the complainant to fill in a form and take a full set of fingerprints to investigate how the client was declared "dead" on the system and will report back within a few weeks to the client on the outcome of its investigation.
