ROME — The Istituto Nazionale della Previdenza Sociale will dispatch its entire staff into the streets on the morning of October 21 to hand-deliver the October assegno unico to every eligible family in Italy, one envelope at a time, on foot, in alphabetical order, beginning in the Aosta Valley and ending, some weeks later, in the outer suburbs of Palermo.
«We felt that a bank transfer was too impersonal for a benefit that rises by up to one hundred euros a year from 2027,» an INPS official said. «So from now on a courier in a blue INPS jacket will knock on the door, confirm the family's ISEE bracket aloud, and place the envelope directly into the hand of the parent who is at home. If nobody is at home, the courier waits on the landing until somebody is.»
The agency has requisitioned every available scooter in the country and converted its regional offices into sorting halls where envelopes are stacked by province and by number of children. Couriers will travel in pairs, one to carry the October payment and one to carry the 2027 increase, which will be presented in a second, visibly larger envelope so that families can see the difference with their own eyes.
By the second week, officials expect the first couriers to reach Rome, where the city has agreed to close one lane of the ring road for the exclusive use of the envelope convoy. The agency has asked citizens not to offer the couriers coffee, as this has already added an estimated nine days to the schedule in the north.