"There was no alignment on dates here, or anything, or guidance from the previous guardianship" and "no decision was made on the withholding tables with the guardianship, with no guardianship, neither with this one nor with the previous one", said the president of ISS, during a hearing in parliament. This hearing was held at the request of the PSD and the CDS-PP following the settlement in April and May of the IRS withheld from pensions paid in January and which resulted in the return of the excess tax withheld to 184 thousand pensioners (which was done with the April pension) and the amount withheld less than 143,800 pensioners (with the May pension and which in this case resulted in a lower amount of that pension). During the hearing, Ana Margarida Vasques was questioned about the fact that the settlement took place in those months and not in February, but she refused political insinuations, stressing that a technical issue was involved and that the settlement became necessary because the provisional withholding tables in the processing of the January pensions did not fully coincide with the final ones. Ana Margarida Vasques also said that, as a rule, the provisional IRS tables are sent by the Ministry of Finance to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security and that this, in turn, sends it to the ISS and that, although not frequent, settlements are not unprecedented. On April 29, after the Jornal de Negócios reported the case of pensioners who were faced with a reduction in the net value of the May pension, ISS clarified that adjustments were made to the withholding of IRS from April and May pensions to correct the withholding made in January based on a "provisional" table for 328 thousand pensioners. This issue of the provisional withholding table and subsequent adjustments caught the new Government by surprise, with the office of the current Minister of Labour, Maria do Rosário Ramalho, revealing "astonishment" and stressing that the matter was not transmitted by the previous executive, which accused of wanting to give an "artificial idea" of increasing pensions before the legislative elections. Maria do Rosário Ramalho also pointed out the fact that this issue was not transmitted to her at the meeting she had with the president of ISS, after assuming the guardianship of the Ministry of Labour. Today, at the hearing, the president of ISS said that she did not address the issue at the meeting "of just over an hour" that she had with the minister, saying that she addressed issues that require political decision or that seemed more relevant to her, and not this issue because the adjustments of withholdings at source "are purely technical issues, which did not and do not require any authorization from the guardianship", because "what we are doing is applying the law". Even so, she said she had informed the Secretary of State for Social Security of the issue when she received the questions from Jornal de Negócios on April 24. In response to questions raised at the hearing, the president of ISS said that the adjustments made in May (payment of a higher amount of tax to compensate for what was paid less in January) averaged around 8.8 euros. Thus, in pensions with a value between 944.80 euros and 1,433 euros, the tax refund was between one and five euros; in pensions between 1,433 and 1,816 euros, the refund was eight euros and in pensions between 1,816 and 3,364, the refund was around 12 euros. Read Also: ISS. IRS settlement of pensions arrived in April and May after the end of tests (Portuguese version)