Businesses in Germiston continue to suffer from the effects of electricity outages.
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Six properties in Victoria Street have been without power for over 15 days by the time GCN went to print.
Martin Britz, Mosaic Funeral Group manager, said the outages severely affected their business and that of their neighbours, Saint Marys Childcare Centre and Aftercare.
Britz said the constant power outages and cable theft made it difficult to run a business in the area.
“We spend money to keep our businesses open. Times are tough, so business is not good.
“As a funeral home, we need to keep the mortuary cold and to run the generator all day costs us R3 500 and another R500 for the office,” said Britz.
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He said this became a challenge for them, especially for the nature of their business.
“Our mortuary equipment is not meant to run on a generator because we must maintain a certain temperature.
“The minute the power goes off, and we use a generator, it affects the environment and has a high potential to damage equipment,” said Britz.
He said he is concerned about insurance that announced the exclusion of all losses caused by electricity grid failure from June 1.
Electricity grid failure means an interruption to or suspension of electricity supply in a manner from whatsoever source and for any reason, including damage and any inability and failure on the part of the supplier, which affects an entire municipality or province of the country at substantially the same time, including any interruption, power surge or suspension at the reconnection or reinstatement of electricity supply.
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“The power outages put us at risk. We now have to hope and pray the equipment does not get damaged because if that happens, we have to repair from our own pockets,” said Britz.
He said cable theft was another problem and as a business, they had to find ways to protect the cables.
“We cannot have a security guard – it is money we don’t have,” said Britz.
He said they have been calling the customer care centre with no help as they are placed on hold for extended periods with no help.
He said when a contractor visited the area recently to turn on the power, he requested a bribe of R450 from them and the daycare.
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“They were about to turn on the power and asked for a bribe. When we told them we had no money to pay for a bribe, they switched the power off and left.
“At this point, we don’t know why – we were not willing to pay the bribe and now we are being punished because we are not receiving any assistance,” said Britz.
GCN sent a request for comment to the City of Ekurhuleni on June 7, requesting comment by June 9.
We received no comment at the time of going to print.
