The billing crisis at the City of Johannesburg is no secret, in fact, the MMC for Finance, Dr Rabelani Dagada said the problem is so big that the entire system needs to be changed.
But how can you, as residents, help ease the burden?
According to Dagada, residents can help by sending through their electricity and water meter readings every month. Dagada said one of the issues, and there were many facing the revenue department, was incorrect estimations.
Other issues include future dates of billing, incorrect applied tariffs, missing meter dates and missing property data. This was revealed at a stakeholder meeting on 18 May centred around the billing crisis and what the City is doing about it.
Dagada agreed that the crisis was indeed much worse than he thought before the Democratic Alliance came into power after the municipal elections last year. More than nine months down the line, the problem is revealing its magnitude.
As of early May, there were more than 48 000 open billing queries in the City, of which 26 000 were 90 to 365 days old.
“A technical support service unit responsible for assisting with meter reading, auditing, disconnection and reconnections and the audit thereof will be established as soon as September this year,” Dagada said.
He added that he was confident that the crisis would have wound down by March next year.
“We expect there to be a 75 per cent reduction in queries and that all queries will be resolved within 30 days,” he said.
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