USING the municipal reporting platforms and reporting faults correctly can reduce the response time and get your problem sorted quicker.

Here are a few useful tips shared by Ward 97 councillor André Beetge:

• There is a distinct difference between a burst pipe where water is visibly gushing out, a loose or damaged connection on a water meter and water bubbling through a tar surface as opposed to trickling, fresh water that tastes, smells and even looks completely different from sewage – and an overflowing manhole is not a burst pipe. These faults are attended to by different departments as there are meter faults and leaks that are dispatched from Pinetown. Network bursts and leaks are dispatched from Isipingo and bulk water lines from Durban. Sewage is attended to by networks, pump stations or mechanical and electrical. Not all plumbers or contractors can work on all faults or carry the necessary tools, equipment or spares to do everything and anything to do with all water problems.

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• A fault to a single dwelling is handled differently from a cluster fault affecting a few houses, a few streets, an entire block, or an area outage. Gaining that type of information prior to reporting would signal the possible type of voltage fault, as opposed to sending the wrong grade technician out in the first place.
• Asking the Parks Department to report a water leak on your behalf, or a person cleaning the street to look into a sewage leak or a contractor attending street lights to service a transformer is not why they are there – their job is to attend to their task – the reporting is to be done by the citizen.
• Provide the correct contact names, numbers, addresses and suburbs. There are four Beach roads in this ward alone, two Nelson, two Middleton, two Oceanview, and two Inyoni Rocks roads. Kingsway Road (Andrew Zondo) is 10km long and runs through different suburbs.
• Locate the closest streetlight pole number, and remember, the people who attend to them are not necessarily from or familiar with the area, so saying things like, ‘next to John Smith’s house’, or ‘where the old drive-in used to be’ or pointing out landmarks only known to the locally initiated would not assist at all.

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• The municipality does not monitor local WhatsApp or social media groups. Reporting must be done using either the WhatsApp reporting numbers for electricity (076 791 2449) or water, sewage and all other faults, except electricity, on 073 148 3477. Note that these are WhatsApp text numbers – they cannot be called to speak to an operator, and you cannot leave a voice message. Alternatively, download the municipal reporting app.
• Once reported, share the correct reference number on local groups or social media with a clear reference to the fault and the streets or area affected. That would enable neighbours to make enquiries using the area-related reference number and eliminate over-reporting of the same fault. This also reduces the number of clipboards and job cards waiting to be attended to by the next available technician, when in fact all relate to the same fault, causing others to wait for available personnel approaching the same fault, only from different angles against different reports.
• Once a job has been attended to, use the same social media platforms to inform others so they are aware and able to determine whether their fault was included or requires additional reporting. This often happens when electrical area faults are attended to and single dwellings remain off or trip out.
• The role of the councillor is not to replace the call centre, to physically repair an electrical outage or to fix a burst pipe. The councillor is there to escalate or to enquire when attention is not extended within a reasonable time from reporting or when complications are experienced by departments after faults have been duly corrected.

DID YOU KNOW?

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