Pay up – or else, metro tells Tshwane residents

The Tshwane metro said it will resume disconnecting any residents who haven’t paid their bills, as it tries to recover more R17-billion owed to it by residents and businesses.

“This will involve the disconnection of conventional (credit) meters and blocking pre-paid meters for arrear accounts of defaulting customers on municipal services such as rates and taxes,” said metro spokesperson Selby Bokaba.

“The blocking of pre-paid meters will be done in such a way that when customers buy electricity tokens, 60% of the purchase amount will be deducted as part payment towards the debt. The remaining 40% will go towards the actual purchase of electricity tokens.

“This will continue for all subsequent purchases until the debt has been settled in full.”

Bokaba said this would take effect from 1 March, following a decision by metro management that all its employees return to work with immediate effect.

He said all counter services and back-office staff would be ready for any long queues and queries resulting from disconnections or pre-paid blocking.

“There has been an exponential increase in the debtors book over the period when credit control measures were suspended,” he said.

“We expect that the full implementation of credit control activities will result in improved cash flow for the metro.”

Finance MMC Mare-Lise Fourie urged residents to pay their bills so that the metro could turn its finances around and continue to provide quality services.

Residents will be informed on how to conclude arrangements.

“Residents will also be encouraged to register their queries through the customer care platform,” she said.

“The metro buys electricity from Eskom and water from Rand Water. It is also responsible for maintaining its infrastructure in addition to collecting refuse and other services. All these services will ground to a halt if residents don’t pay their municipal bills.”

She said it was envisaged that credit control processes would be targeted to ensure that accounts submitted for credit control purposes are accurate and have been quality-checked.

Any disconnected accounts would be immediately reconnected once payment has been made or an arrangement has been made with the municipality.