UGU estimates a retired Freeland Park couple has been consuming an average of 0.648 litres of water every minute of the day since January this year.
Well, that seems to be Ugu’s best ‘guess’… and they have been charging Robert and Joan Ray accordingly.
Mr Ray estimates that he has been overcharged by R3 082.30 so far. Add to that the cost of countless telephone calls, petrol driving to the Ugu offices in Park Rynie and wasted time trying to get someone to look into his case for the past year.
“While I’m certainly not happy about being overcharged, it’s also the principle that upsets me,” said Mr Ray.
“Ugu obviously has not even bothered to take a reading since January and have just guessed how much to charge me. One wonders how many others are being overcharged like this?”
Mr Ray started to wonder about his water bill earlier in the year when he saw that he was charged for 28 kilolitres of water in January. That equates to 1 000 litres per day. Even stranger, the Rays were away for half of that month.
“That was absurd, especially as we don’t have a garden or a pool,” said Mr Ray.
So after numerous phone calls, personal visits to Ugu and empty promises, Mr Ray decided to take readings himself.
After a lengthy search outside his property, he eventually found the water meter under a bush, hidden by weeds.
“It was obvious nobody had come out to read it in ages,” he said.
Mr Ray has now been taking his own readings and the water consumption is nowhere near what he is being charged for, but still nobody at Ugu will help him.
As a last resort, he decided to bring his story to the Mid South Coast Mail in the hope that someone in authority would sit up and take note.
“I would also like to warn other consumers not to take their water bill at face value,” he said.
Ugu District Municipality was asked for comment, but none was received at the time of publishing.
