Durban - Chatsworth residents have expressed anger at the high municipal bills they have been forced to pay in recent years.
At a meeting held at Woodhurst Library on Tuesday between residents and Thami Mdluli, eThekwini Municipality’s customer services officer, they complained about being billed twice every month.
Also, that their water and electricity meters had apparently been read inaccurately, leading to incorrect billing.
Aggrieved resident Mervin Naidoo claimed he had been over charged by R44000 this year.
“We’ve been having this problem for the past three years.”
Naidoo said this forced him to make a payment arrangement with the municipality to debit his bank account monthly.
He said he was battling to make ends meet.
“We’ve been to the municipality a number of times and nothing comes of it,” Naidoo said.
He said when he went to the municipality to complain, staff promised to assess the bill and fix the discrepancies.
Naidoo, a driver, said his average bill was about R3000, but it had shot up to R6000.
The father of three said most of his salary was spent on his bill.
Pradeep Singh said he had had a billing problem for the past three years and claimed he had been overcharged R47000.
When he enquired about the bill, Singh was shoved from pillar to post. “Why did they change from the old to the new system,” he asked.
Other residents also expressed a preference for the former system.
Mdluli, the municipality’s customer services officer for the South Western region, which included Chatsworth and Lamontville, said the billing system had to be upgraded as it was not compatible with other software used by the municipality.
He said issues raised had not only affected Chatsworth residents, but people from other areas as well.
He urged those who received high bills to immediately visit the city’s office.
If left too long the problem became harder to resolve, he said.
Tony Govender, ward 70 councillor, believed the issue was not with the billing system, but with meter readers recording the numbers incorrectly.