81-year-old is still waiting for his Eskom refund

Mboneni William Masebe has been waiting since March for R1,000 worth of electricity units which he is owed by Eskom.

For months the 81-year-old has been visiting and telephoning Eskom offices in Louis Trichardt and Sibasa.

In March this year the Vleifontein area where he lives experienced load shedding for 12 hours. When power was restored his home remained dark and he telephoned Eskom. Eskom restored the electricity supply but changed the meter number.

Unaware of this, his daughter, who works in Pretoria, bought R1,000 worth of electricity using the old meter number the same day.

On 13 May 2019 Masebe notified the Eskom branch in Louis Trichardt where he was told he would get a response the following day. When there was no response, he visited the branch offices several more times but nothing was resolved until the branch referred the matter to the Eskom manager in Sibasa.

“I am a pensioner I can not afford the transport cost every week to Louis Trichardt or Sibasa offices,” said Masebe, adding that Eskom blamed him for the error. Transport from Vleifontein to Louis Tichardt and back using a minibus taxi costs R34.

Masebe also wrote a letter on 14 June 2019 and faxed it to Eskom. Eskom has not yet responded to the letter.

Masebe made several calls to Eskom manager in Sibasa and later visited the manager. The manager promised to send him a written response through Louis Trichardt Eskom branch. On 12 September 2019 Masebe visited the Louis Trichardt offices but there was no letter from the Sibasa manager.

Ntshavheni Nenguda from Eskom customer care in an email response to GroundUp said the R1,000 worth of electricity units would be refunded to the customer.

Republished from GroundUp.