Resident cries foul over metro’s billing system
A frustrated Boksburg resident, Nicole Barlow, will be taking the metro to court to ensure that legal action is taken to stop, what she says, has been illegal disconnections of residents' electricity by the metro.
Barlow will raise a few matters in court, but her main case is that there is no time-frame stipulated in the credit control policy (clause 5.7 (a)) as to when and how accounts in arrears are to be handled.
She claims that the metro switch off residents’ electricity as and when they please, without following any set time-frame that has been stipulated in writing.
“I will challenge them in court and suggest that a time-frame be specified of when a final notice should be handed out, and how many days thereafter should action be taken against the non-payer,” says Barlow.
Barlow points out that contractors who are in charge of disconnections, delivering of final notices and reconnections, are not properly managed by the metro.
“The day a notice is printed, the day on the notice, and the day it gets delivered is a few days apart, and this does not give the ratepayer the same time-frame stipulated (seven days) in the credit control policy to attend to the matter, causing legal implications and illegal disconnections as proper procedure is not followed,” complains Barlow.
“A notice should be delivered on the same day that it is issued, not three or even five days later.”
According to her, this results in residents not being able to pay in time, therefore, the electricity is disconnected. A reconnection fee then has to be charged as well.
Barlow’s concern is that residents are being charged R87.78 for the distribution of Final Notices.
“This fee should be reimbursed to residents who have received final notices without allowing for enough time to pay their accounts. For example, if you pay the metro from another bank account and it reflects only a couple of days later in the metro’s account, you are deemed to be in arrears.”
She notes that because the system of how the metro and contractors are handling accounts and notices, residents end up paying a total of over R300 to get their electricity reconnected.
Over time, she says, the R300 paid by residents results into millions that land into the coffers of the metro.
She says these fees are illegal means that the metro has been profiting from.
Barlow says she will also contest the water restriction law, which will allegedly be passed, allowing the metro to give a restricted amount of water to a resident until they pay their account.
According to Barlow, there are also no credit control policies regulating prepaid meters.
“There is no law that governs the prepaid system. People with prepaid meters should not have their electricity disconnected under any circumstances, as this contravenes the Spoliation Act,” she points out.
The metro has also raised concerns that the current credit control measures are not strict enough.
In the recent budget speech presented by the metro, it was made public that residents in Ekurhuleni owed an outstanding debt to the city of almost R12-billion.
Mayoral Member of Committee (MMC) for finance, Clr Moses Makwakwa, pointed out, that the metro would apply aggressive credit control measures to recover this amount.
“Our debtors book is increasing because of outstanding payments from businesses, government and residents of Ekurhuleni,” said Makwakwa.
“We remain very concerned by the fact that we are still collecting below our target of 93 per cent, whilst there is high capital pressure for service delivery,” he added.
Makwakwa said that through the implementation of the revised revenue protection and enhancement project, the city would continue the battle of improving on collection.
Barlow says with this legal action she will be taking on the public interest litigation on behalf of Boksburg residents.
“I urge the public to come forward with further evidence to strengthen the case against the metro, especially pictures that specify dates of incidents,” says Barlow.
Affected residents may email Barlow on barlow@hotmail.co.za. – @TumeloBoksburg
The same thing happens in Delmore and Delmore Gardens the people are paying the contractors to reconnect their electricity our boxes are all open the metro have been contacted but they are not interested.If they take out the cable residents re-connect with their own cable.No electrician comes out their is all colour cables in the boxes.We dont know who to complain to because you dont know if the officials at The municipality are involved
I would like to add the following:
1. We regularly get charged the fee for the delivery of a final notice but never receive the actual final notice. I have a friend in Libradene that has the same issue and is in fact in advance on her account.
2. We have also had our electricity disconnected at times when the account has been paid. I took the time to go into the Municipality to find out why this was happening and to check if the account was perhaps in arrears that I wasn’t aware of. No problem was found on the account and there were no arrears.
3. On the rare occasion that a final notice has been delivered, the electricity is cut at the same time that the notice has been delivered. I have watched the person drop the notice in the mailbox and walk straight over to the electricity box to disconnect giving me no time to even argue the point that the account is not in arrears and has in fact been paid. As the phones are never answered for the numbers printed on the final notice I then have to take time off to go into the Municipality to get it sorted out. Highly annoying when there is absolutely no reason for the disconnection in the first place.
Most of us get paid after 25th of each month which results in being “in arrears” on paper every month, but in actual fact we are not. We pay the full amount that is due every month but yet we always look “in arrears”. We do not pay later than 28th but received numerous final notices and got charged for it! Cannot query over the phone, as there is no answer, you have to take leave and when you go to them they are so unbelievable unhelpful!! When you finally get someone to assist you, they find nothing wrong on the account and just scrap your name off a list. Even when I pay from the STD Bank link for Ekurhuleni, I get the next month’s statement and was still in arrears! I actually feel they are on a witchhunt with our monthly payers which they can get hold of because they cannot get hold of the people who owe them the R12bil. I am really so annoyed with this situation! I am so glad someone finally take these people to court