Shannon Groenewald received the shock of her life when she received her bill from the metro and it was three times the normal amount.
When she got in touch with the metro, she was told it is the new law.
The law states the metro will now be charging per erf the property is on and not per property.
Groenewald was charged three times for metro services because her house is built across three erven.
The Geduld resident says this is grossly unfair and unaffordable for many, especially her neighbours, some of whom are pensioners and are on a fixed income.
“The metro cannot possibly expect us to pay three times for services that we only receive once.
“We have one house and one bin, the rest is garden.
“This is literally taking food out of pensioners’ mouths.
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“It’s not only us, many houses in and around our area are being affected,” says Groenewald.
When Groenewald asked the metro if there was any way in which the bill could be reduced, she was told she could consolidate her erven into one property.
However, the process to do this costs over R20 000, which she says she simply does not have.
Also baffling to Groenewald was why the metro does not use the method of “parent/child” valuations when dealing with the situation where two or more stands are registered in the name of the same owner.
This implies that they register in their rates system that Erf 101 is the parent erf, and the other two (102 and 103) are the child (children) erven.
What then follows is that you will receive only one account on Erf 101, but rated at the value of all three erven.
Erf 101 will then carry the full value of the property, and erven 102 and 103 will have a zero-value rating.
“The metro uses this method in Boksburg, why can’t they use it here as it is the same municipality?” asks Groenewald.
The metro failed to respond in time for publication.
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