National Commercial Bank Jamaica Limited (NCB) has said it will be reimbursing late fees to customers impacted by delayed salary payments due to kinks in a recent system upgrade.

The bank said reimbursements are available for persons who incurred late payment fees for utility companies as well as loans and credit cards held at other financial institutions due to the delayed payments. It said its own customers would not incur late fees on NCB loan and credit card facilities.

To request reimbursement, customers are invited to visit a branch and speak with their Relationship Officer or Branch Manager or send an email to salary@jncb.com, along with any supporting documentation so that we can review and address each issue as soon as possible.

Following a system upgrade, which triggered disruptions to its online banking platform and mobile application, NCB experienced delays uploading payroll files affecting salary payments, which were expected last Friday.

“For customers concerned about the impact of late payments on their credit report, we will be working closely with the credit bureaus and other stakeholders, to mitigate this.” President and CEO of the NCB Financial Group, Patrick Hylton, said.

Grade four students tackle PEP performance task this week

Grade four students across the island will sit the first official Primary Exit Profile (PEP) Grade Four performance task test on May 30 and 31.

Acting Chief Education Officer Winnie Berry said sample questions are available on the Ministry of Education, Youth and Information’s official PEP website – pep.moey.gov.jm – for both educators and parents to access.

PEP is the series of tests that have replaced the Grade Six Achievement Test as the national secondary school entrance examination. It is intended to provide a better and more complete profile of students’ academic and critical-thinking capabilities at the end of primary-level education.

Students will sit the PEP exams over three years in grades four, five and six. Grade six students previously sat their Ability Test on February 26 and their Performance Task exams on March 27 and 28.

Grade five students will sit the first PEP Grade Five Performance Task test on June 20.

Jamaica only Caribbean country in IAEA project to help fight food fraud

VIENNA, Austria (CMC):

Jamaica is the only Caribbean country included in a five-year research project announced last week Wednesday by the Austria-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to refine methods to apply nuclear-derived techniques to test for accuracy in food labels.

It said that the participating countries in the research project, which started with a kick-off meeting last week, are China, Costa Rica, Denmark, India, Indonesia, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Malaysia, Morocco, Myanmar, New Zealand, Slovenia, Spain, Thailand and Uruguay.

IAEA said that the outcome of the project, carried out in cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), will assist countries in combatting fraud in high-value food products, such as premium honey, coffee and speciality rice varieties.

The project will help countries apply stable isotope techniques to protect and promote foods with added-value, such as organic food or products with specific geographical origins like Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee.

The method works by looking at the ratio of stable isotopes in elements – such as hydrogen, oxygen and carbon – and the concentration of elements in a sample of the product. These can provide a unique fingerprint that links a crop to the place where it is cultivated.