What South Africans still call workmen compensation is administered by the Compensation Fund, part of the Department of Employment and Labour, under the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act. It covers employees injured or made ill by their work. The contact details below were read from the departmental contacts page on 31 August 2026.
Official contact channels
- Compensation Fund: 0860 105 350
- Call centre: [email protected]
- Enquiries: [email protected]
- Complaints: [email protected]
- Department switchboard: 012 309 4000
- Office hours: 07:30 to 16:00, Monday to Friday
Note the early close: 16:00, not 17:00, and no weekend service. The Fund publishes separate mailboxes for enquiries and for complaints, so a complaint sent to the enquiries address is slower than one sent to CF-Complaints.
Services and responsibilities
The Compensation Fund pays compensation for occupational injuries and diseases: medical costs, temporary or permanent disablement benefits, and death benefits to dependants where an employee dies as a result of work.
Two points decide most claims:
- The employer must report the injury. Reporting obligations sit with the employer, not the injured worker, and the Fund cannot process what has never been registered. If your employer has not reported it, that is the first thing to establish and, if necessary, to complain about.
- Claims are traced by claim number. Get it at the outset and quote it in every contact – without it a follow-up starts from nothing.
Before contacting the Fund, have the claim number, your identity number, the employer name and registration details, the date of the accident or diagnosis, and the medical reports. Where a medical practitioner is chasing payment, the practice number is needed too.
The Compensation Fund is distinct from the Unemployment Insurance Fund, which sits in the same department but deals with unemployment, maternity and illness benefits rather than workplace injury. The UIF is at 230 Lillian Ngoyi Street, Absa Towers, Pretoria Central, on 0800 030 007. Contacting the wrong fund is one of the commonest sources of delay.
Office and address information
- Compensation Fund: Compensation House, Delta Heights Building, 167 Thabo Sehume Street, Pretoria
- Office hours: 07:30 to 16:00, Monday to Friday
The Department of Employment and Labour also operates labour centres across the country, and an injury claim can usually be lodged and followed up at the labour centre nearest you rather than by travelling to Pretoria. That is the practical route for most claimants.
Applications and escalation
Escalate in order: the employer, then the labour centre or the Fund call centre, then [email protected] in writing with the claim number and a dated history.
Where someone asks for payment to release a claim or to speed one up, that is corruption and there are dedicated channels:
- Departmental fraud hotline: 0860 666 883, [email protected]
- National Anti-Corruption Hotline, Public Service Commission: 0800 701 701
A compensation claim is free to lodge. No official may charge you to submit or advance one, and no agent is required.
If the Fund does not resolve the matter, maladministration by an organ of state is investigated by the Public Protector on 0800 112 040 toll-free or 012 366 7000, [email protected].
Sources
- labour.gov.za contacts page, Compensation Fund and UIF listings, read 31 August 2026
- pprotect.org published contact details