Scheme for Grant of Financial Assistance to Industrial Workers/Employee for Purchase of Spectacles

What is the Goa spectacles scheme for industrial workers?

The Scheme for Grant of Financial Assistance to Industrial Workers/Employee for Purchase of Spectacles is Scheme No. V of the Goa Labour Welfare Board, an ancillary body of the Office of the Commissioner of Labour and Employment, Government of Goa. The scheme reimburses an industrial worker up to Rs 2,000 towards the cost of a spectacle frame and lenses.

The Goa Labour Welfare Board draws its authority from the Goa, Daman and Diu Labour Welfare Fund Act, 1986, which the Labour Department records as being in force from 26 January 1990. The Act creates a Labour Welfare Fund built from contributions of workers, employers and the state government, and the Board runs a set of 19 welfare schemes out of that fund. The spectacles scheme sits alongside schemes for textbooks and notebooks, school uniforms, scholarships, child care benefit for women workers, examination-performance incentives, attendance incentives for girl students, and assistance for retrenched and laid-off workers.

The design of the spectacles scheme is deliberately narrow. Poor uncorrected vision is a common and cheap-to-fix problem on a factory floor, and the Board's answer is a single, capped, one-in-five-years reimbursement rather than an open-ended medical benefit. There is no age limit, no separate income test beyond the employer's certificate about the worker's circumstances, and no requirement to buy from a listed vendor.

Who is eligible for spectacles assistance in Goa?

You can claim if:

• You are an industrial worker or employee in an industrial establishment in Goa.
• You have completed one year of service in the industrial establishment as on the date of the application. The scheme text expressly allows broken spells of service to be computed together, so a worker who has moved between spells in the same establishment is not shut out.
• You are covered under clause (C) of section 2 of the Goa, Daman and Diu Labour Welfare Fund Act, 1986, that is, you fall within the Act's definition of an employee for whom the welfare fund exists.
• You have had your eyes tested at a State Hospital, at Goa Medical College, or by a qualified optician, and you hold the lens number for the spectacles.
• You have not been supplied spectacles under the scheme in the last five years.

You cannot apply if:

• You have less than one year of service, counted across broken spells, on the date of the application.
• You are not an employee covered by the 1986 Act, the scheme is not open to government servants, self-employed people, shopkeepers or domestic workers who fall outside the industrial establishments the Act reaches.
• You already received spectacles under this scheme within the previous five years. Only a lens change qualifies before that, and only after one year from the purchase for which the last reimbursement was made.
• You have no cash receipt for the purchase. The Board reimburses on production of the receipt and the prescription, so an undocumented purchase cannot be paid.

How much money does the scheme give?

The Goa Labour Welfare Board bears the cost of the frame and lenses to the extent of Rs 2,000. Where the cost exceeds Rs 2,000, the scheme states plainly that the excess is met by the industrial worker or employee.

A second, smaller figure applies to lens changes. A worker already supplied with spectacles is barred from a fresh pair for five years, but if the power of the lenses needs to change, the lenses alone may be replaced after one year from the date of the purchase for which the last reimbursement was made, at a cost not exceeding Rs 400.

What documents are required?

How to apply for the Goa spectacles scheme

1. Confirm your service. Check that you have completed one year of service in your industrial establishment as on the date you apply, counting broken spells together.
2. Get your eyes tested at a State Hospital in Goa, at Goa Medical College, or with a qualified optician, and obtain the lens number for your spectacles.
3. Download or collect the Scheme-V form from the Goa Labour Welfare Board pages on labour.goa.gov.in, or from the Board's office at Shrama Shakti Bhavan, 2nd Floor, Patto Plaza, Panaji, Goa 403001.
4. Fill in the applicant portion; name, father's name, age, sex, name of the industrial establishment or contractor, name of the owner, designation, date of appointment, past establishments worked in, monthly wage, whether you already wear spectacles, and the declaration that you have not been supplied spectacles for the last five years.
5. Get the management's certificate signed and sealed. The manager, owner or contractor fills the service table, states your monthly wage excluding bonus, and certifies that your economic condition makes buying spectacles difficult.
6. Get the two medical certificates signed; one by the Medical Officer of the organisation referring you for examination, and one by the eye specialist recording right and left vision and the lens numbers.
7. Purchase the spectacles and keep the original cash receipt together with the optician's or doctor's prescription.
8. Submit the complete set to the Secretary, Goa Labour Welfare Board, at Shrama Shakti Bhavan, 2nd Floor, Patto Plaza, Panaji. Reimbursement is made on production of the receipt and the prescription.

How to check the status of your claim

The Goa Labour Welfare Board does not publish an online status tracker for this scheme. Follow up with the Board's office directly, quoting the date on which you submitted the form and the name of your industrial establishment. The Office of the Commissioner, Labour and Employment can be reached on 0832-2437081, 0832-2437082 or 0832-2437083, or by email at com-labo.goa@nic.in. Keep a photocopy of the submitted form and a copy of the cash receipt, because the original receipt travels with the claim.

Why claims get rejected, and how to fix them

• Service short of one year. The commonest problem. Ask your employer to certify earlier broken spells in the same establishment, which the scheme allows to be added together.
• No cash receipt, or a receipt without the shop's details. Reimbursement is expressly made against the cash receipt; an estimate or a handwritten slip is weak evidence. Ask the optician for a proper receipt.
• Missing eye specialist certificate or lens numbers. The form has a separate panel for the specialist. A prescription alone, without that panel filled in, leaves the claim incomplete.
• Five-year bar. If you were supplied spectacles under the scheme less than five years ago, only a lens replacement is possible, capped at Rs 400 and only after one year from the last reimbursed purchase.
• Employer certificate unsigned or unsealed. The management's seal is part of the form. Without it the service period and wage are unverified.

Where to raise a grievance

Grievances on this scheme go to the Secretary, Goa Labour Welfare Board, and above that to the Commissioner of Labour and Employment, Government of Goa, Shrama Shakti Bhavan, 2nd Floor, Patto Plaza, Panaji, Goa 403001. The office telephones are 0832-2437081, 82 and 83, and the email is com-labo.goa@nic.in. The Labour Welfare Board's scheme documents, including the Scheme-V text and form, are published on labour.goa.gov.in, so a worker who is refused can check the printed rule for themselves before escalating.

No fee is payable to apply, and no agent is needed. The Goa Labour Welfare Board pays the reimbursement out of the Labour Welfare Fund created by the 1986 Act, to which the worker's own contribution has already been made.