In an alternative state lottery, Portugal’s government has paid out over half a million euros to pensioners who had already died.
In many cases the deaths had been correctly recorded in the computer systems yet the payments continued as nobody had thought to suspend them.
The money was paid out to 28 deceased pensioners at the rate of €569 a month.
The errors have now been detected in an investigation conducted by the Ministry of Social Security pension system's audit team but had been allowed to run, unchecked and undetected for seven years.
In addition to these cases, the audit also detected 502 pensioners that had been overpaid a total of €1,700 due to computer errors.
The Institute of Social Security confirmed the over-payments, but reported that it had been ‘requesting’ the respective heirs to repay the sums.
