eThekwini Mayor urges councillors to help tackle billing issues

Ethekwini Mayor Cyril Xaba has urged councillors to support the city’s efforts to eradicate the ongoing billing issues in the metro.

He was speaking during a full council sitting where councillors slammed the city for failing to resolve ongoing billing problems.

Xaba encouraged customers to use the city’s dispute resolution management system to resolve issues with bill inaccuracies.

He says they are also on a campaign to educate residents on how to lodge disputes.

“All we need is for councillors not to complain, but to go all out and publicise these initiatives to the public because we have put them out as part of assisting and alleviating the challenges or the burden that they face,” he says.

Meanwhile, eThekwini Municipality continues to face sharp criticism over its billing problems that have left customers with huge bills.

The city tabled the billing report for July during a full council sitting in Durban.

It shows that 99% of the nearly 930,000 account holders were billed.

But political parties raised concerns that many electricity and water meters remain unread.

Ninety-four per cent of water meters were read in urban areas, while 82% were read in rural areas.

Meanwhile, over 27,000 faulty meters were reported.

Councillors from the IFP, DA and ActionSA have raised concerns about residents having to pay for services they may not have used due to administrative errors.