Ratepayers challenge Buffalo City Metro's infuriating readings and billings

Residents of tottering Buffalo City Metro say they are still beating against a wall of official indifference over irrational billing.

A wave of legal resistance is growing with ratepayers' associations across the city coming together to take BCM to court, according to Gonubie Ratepayers Association chair Henry Smith.

Gonubie residents have taken to social media to claim that not only are their water readings disturbingly inaccurate, but in some instances, BCM is demanding payments for water readings on both old and new meters — at the same property, in the same month.

Gonubians shared their frustrations and fury over their perception that they were being fleeced.

BCM spokesperson Sam Ngwenya asked to be provided with details of the accounts that were billed twice “so that the matter can be handed over to the billing section, because each account is treated on its own merit”.

“There are a number of variations that affect each account, such as change of ownership.”

Since December 2020, BCM had installed 18,440 smart meters for electricity and 46,724 smart meters for water, Ngwenya said.

Smith said irate residents were drawing up legal papers to take BCM to court.

“There is a problem with the water billing, and there have been complaints over the high water bills and the way BCM calculates them,” Smith said.

He said other ratepayers' associations in the metro would be joining them in taking legal action against the metro.

A resident who said she had been incorrectly billed said she tried to contact the municipality to ask why bills were being charged twice in one month, but, weeks later, had still not received an explanation.

She said: “People need to be made aware of this. It is an atrocious situation.

“They seem unable to sort out the billing problem. We asked pertinent questions from BCM and they have not responded.”

She had been struggling with BCM over their irrational accounting since 2019.

“They have wrongly billed us for a period of two years. They do an interim billing and then won't reverse it properly.

“Yet they will add on interest on those arrears amounts though we have given them readings.

“To top it all, they are doing something unlawful — they block the prepaid electrical meter if you have an outstanding amount on your account, and the method of blocking is something the public needs to be aware of.”

She said BCM had made some reverse payments, but not for all customers who had been wrongly billed.  

Real estate specialist Robyn Hobbs, of Harcourts, said her office had received numerous billing queries which were not being resolved by BCM. One complaint had been logged with BCM more than two years ago. 

Hobbs said: “It becomes extremely difficult to explain to landlords and tenants that accounts still need to be paid, while the query is being looked at when some accounts run into thousands of rand. 

“The most frustrating of all is that we have offered to supply water readings only to be told that the new smart meter reading does not need to be read by the resident at the property.”

Gonubie DA ward councillor André Swart said the problem had escalated with the introduction of smart water meters in 2020.

“The smart water readers were installed last year and came into operation in February this year,” Swart said.

“The old meters should have been stopped and removed. Yet people are now billed on two water meters and that is ludicrous.”

He said the matter had been taken up with BCM's billing department.

“I’ve seen some of those accounts but unfortunately, through all these years and all these queries, the billing department is probably looking at a turnaround period of 30 to 60 days.

“There have already been 25 people who have contacted me about their queries.”

DispatchLIVE