This article builds on the existing literature on the material effects of cash transfers by focusing on the percieved social and relational effects as a result of receiving a cash transfer and the degree to which cash transfers can be said to be ‘transformative’ and in what ways. Our aim is to contribute to this debate by exploring people’s own perceptions on what role unconditional cash transfers have on social relations. Even though recent research are beginning to emerge which takes a more qualitative approach to studying the impacts of cash transfers in the global South, most rely on quantitative measures. Thus, there is still a gap in the literature when it comes to research which has a primary focus on beneficiaries’ own perspectives on the social impacts of cash transfers. This article contributes to the literature asking if and in what way cash transfers can have broader social and relational implications for caregiver recipients, their households and communities, using the effects of the Child Support Grant (CSG) in a rural village of South Africa as an example. In this study we argue that the Child Support Grant has had largely positive social transformative effects on individuals, (especially concerning a sense of dignity, feelings of autonomy, increased decision-making powers for primary caregivers, usually mothers or grandmothers), households and communities, although some contested effects and limitations were also found.