THE Executive Committee of eThekwini Municipality is considering offering ratepayers who are in arrears, relief by writing off accrued debt.
A report tabled at an online meeting of Exco this week outlining the special payment relief due to Covid-19 for customers in arrears was approved by the committee.
The report proposes to write off accrued debt as a relief to account holders with arrear debt of 90 days or more.
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The report notes that the City’s financial position has changed drastically as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown. Before the lockdown on 27 March, the City had a collection rate of 94 percent.
The report states that while it was anticipated that cash collection for April would still be on a stable path as customers would have received their monthly salaries, the collection rate for April however plunged to 56 percent, an ever-low collection rate for the City.
Other measures providing relief to customers that have already been implemented were also outlined in the report. These include no interest being charged on arrear accounts during the lockdown period and no disconnections during the lockdown.
A further measure contained in the report to provide relief to customers includes an initiative to reverse the total interest raised to a customer’s account if the customer pays 50 per cent of their arrears on or before 30 June 2020 with the remainder of the debt to be put on a payment plan not exceeding 24 months, interest free. This incentive will only be offered to customers with debt of 90 days or older.
All interest written off will be reinstated in a case where a customer defaults on the payment plan. Existing customers on a payment plan can be offered an opportunity to take part in this incentive as a once-off offering.
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