Joburg says payments are processed, but decades of uncollected tariffs and errors continue driving the city’s growing municipal debt crisis.
Joburg has dismissed reports of widespread billing disruptions, despite claims on social media. Picture: Michel Bega
The City of Joburg has grappled for more than 16 years with inflated tariffs, unallocated payments and unlawful service disconnections, with residents, including pensioners, receiving massive and often incorrect bills – in some cases running into millions of rand.
The situation has been described as a financial “death spiral” driven by weak debt collection, poor management and failing IT systems.
In Ekurhuleni, consumer debt has climbed above R30.9 billion, with collection rates as low as 27.15% in some areas, prompting renewed Eskom power cut threats.
‘Death spiral’
Tshwane, meanwhile, has faced scrutiny over double billing for city cleansing levies and rising debt impairments.
Yet again, it has been reported that Joburg’s two-core billing systems reportedly went offline and its customer services centres stopped accepting payments on Monday.
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All payments made since 19 January reportedly did not reflect on the city’s systems or its self-service e-Joburg portal.
This meant residents and businesses should keep all proof of payments, should they be necessary later.
The city’s e-Joburg portal reportedly shows zero payments on any statements for the past two years and no payments at all under any account’s payment history.
City of Joburg denies billing failures
But the city has since rejected claims that its municipal payment systems are failing to reflect customer payments, dismissing reports of widespread billing disruptions as misleading.
The metro said in a statement it had become aware of social media messages suggesting that municipal payments were not reflecting on customer statements, but insisted these claims were incorrect.
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“Payments made through official channels continue to be processed and reflected on customer accounts,” said Kgamanyane Maphologela, director of communications and stakeholder management.
He added claims that customers with up-to-date accounts could face service disconnections were unfounded.
“Customers whose accounts are in good standing are not subjected to credit control disconnections,” Maphologela said.
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