Billing queries could become a thing of the past for Joburg residents, according to the member of the mayoral committee for finance, Funzela Ngobeni, who has vowed to “turn the tide” in the battle to reduce the large number of billing-related queries.
Ngobeni was speaking to The Sunday Independent after presenting the City’s R51 billion budget for the 2018/19 financial year in Braamfontein on Thursday.
He said his budget speech had touched on billing issues, and his department had acknowledged the teething problems that existed in this regard. “We recognise that the challenge is still there but we think we are turning the tide. There is a lot of improvement... regarding addressing the billing problems.
“We are working very closely with Johannesburg Water, City Power, the property unit department, Pikitup... these are the value chain departments that actually have to work together in order to address this issue.
“As part of the SAP (Systems, Applications and Products) business transformation process, the City is ensuring our processes and controls are tightened to improve the overall billing system and customer experience,” said Ngobeni.
In his budget speech Ngobeni said R120 million had been allocated to City Power for the replacement of old meters with automated pre-paid meters to reduce the need for manual meter-reading. “In so doing we will increase the... accuracy of meters. This is expected to reduce the many billing queries related to incorrect meter readings,” he said.
Ngobeni said the City was changing its approach to dealing with queries. “There will be a number of interventions taken to turn the situation around. As a City, we have identified the bulk of queries relating to estimations on electricity and water meters and the low coverage of physical meter-reading.
“A dedicated team has been established to ensure that all queries older than 30 days are attended to immediately. We have identified customers who have raised billing queries with our call centre and customer service centres and have implemented a proactive process to gather more information, enabling us to deal directly with people who have registered queries,” he said.
Over the past few months this year The Sunday Independent has reported on residents who have been billed incorrectly due to incorrect meter numbers and faulty meter readings. One was Keenen Whittaker from Maraisburg, who was incorrectly billed R48000 for electricity because of a faulty meter.
The Sunday Independent