City probes billing crisis

Investigations have begun into suspected cybercrime – which resulted in a massive billing crisis for thousands of Johannesburg residents – but it is uncertain how long it will take to catch the culprits and clear the backlog, the city says.

Residents are, meanwhile, asked to exercise patience while the problem is rectified, City of Johannesburg spokesperson Luyanda Mfeka has pleaded.

“Residents are urged to utilise avenues available such as contact centres and call centres. The system has not crashed and we have enough capacity to resolve this. We also don't know how long will take to investigate it,” he said.

“We empathise with frustrations and we are doing all we can. We ask for patience. We are working extremely hard to end this.”

The city this week said its revenue department reported “serious failure in its customer statement delivery system relating to the April accounts”.

“This failure has resulted in approximately 412 000 accounts not being issued with a further 97 000 account statements being issued incorrectly,” it said.

It was the first time the automated system had ever produced an error of this magnitude, said mayor Herman Mashaba, before adding it was therefore suspected that the system was tampered with.

“I have instructed the city to engage with law enforcement agencies and the cyber-crimes unit to investigate the cause of the failure,” he said.

Mfeka said it was hoped the “legacy of double billing” would be solved by the end of June. “We are reforming the billing system. It’s an ongoing project,” he said.

Affected residents were asked to make payments based on their average historical bills.

“In most cases that will be sufficient,” Mfeka claimed.

The city asks its customers to call Joburg Connect on 0860 Joburg (562-874) to enquire how much is owed. Where a customer requires a copy of their account, they may visit their nearest customer service centre or call the city’s call centre.

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