Property owners issued with extremely high utility bills now have legal recourse.
In a 2017 judgement issued by Judge S. Yacoob, property owners who receive extremely high utility bills will not be liable to pay for them. This comes after the case of Argent Industrial Investment (Pty) Ltd versus the municipality held in 2015. For over five years, Ekurhuleni Municipality charged Argent for an estimated water consumption, based on no actual metre readings. The bills were paid accordingly, but in 2015, an exorbitant amount of R1,152,666.98 was called to be paid for.
Argent’s defense was that they were not liable to pay the difference between the estimated water consumption costs and the actual water costs, as the figure was already three years old at the time the bill was finally received. The municipality argued that the period in which Argent had to pay only began once Argent was billed by them.
The judge ruled that if a consumer receives charges older than three years, they cannot be held accountable for those charges. The judge also ruled that it’s not the consumer’s responsibility to take care of metre readings, and that a consumer can’t take care of and pay for any debt that they have not been made aware of.
If the municipality has failed to take regular meter readings for a number of years, an industry average must now be applied. The industry average is calculated by averaging consumption over the months of inconsistency. So if you’ve purchased a property for sale in Boksburg, for example, and have received an extremely high bill, you can now take action against the relevant municipality.
