Makana billing explained
are you able to determine when those readings were taken. This makes it difficult to check whether the readings are accurate or not.
The next column Consumption, tells you how much water and electricity you have consumed by deducting the Old Reading from the New Reading. The problem is that at no point does your bill say when the two readings were taken. All we know is that the one was done before the other – and definitely not on the days specified in the Meter Reading Period.
Water Consumption
To understand the Levied Amount for water (see fig 1) you need to go to the next block and look for three line items marked as Water Usage. You will notice that there are three different tariffs: R6.13 for each of the first ten kilolitres; R7.77 for the next ten and R8.56 each for the final three kilolitres. Add up the progressively more expensive amounts for water and you have R164.68 which is charged for the 23 kilolitres consumed between the old reading and the new reading. Notice that for water consumption – if the municipality were to take readings more frequently a greater propor- tion of water consumption would be billed at lower rates. However, we do not know how often the municipality reads our meters. The unreliability of municipal meter readers allows the municipality to bill for more water consumption at the higher tariffs.
Electricity Components
There are two components to your electricity bill. The first one relates to how much electricity you have consumed. Usually the municipality does not take a reading so they usually estimate a random amount and charge you for that arguing that any differences will be corrected once they get around to reading your meter. The actual amount consumed, or the estimated amount is then multiplied by the tariff of 1.39 which will give you a rand value of your electricity consumption.
There are various types of meters in use in the Makana area. The photograph in Fig 2 shows a type of meter that has been extensively used in Grahamstown for decades. The meter readers sometimes make mistakes so you should always check your meters and compare readings to the bills.
Some people have difficulty reading these old fash- ioned meters. In fig 2, each little circle from left to right represents a single digit of a larger number so that this one reflects an accumulative consumption of 77 561 kilo watt hours.
The second component of your electricity bill is a fixed amount that they charge every month. In the case of the bill in fig 1 – an amount of R424.20.
This is marked as code 000405 which is not explained anywhere on the bill, but we presume it is some kind of connection fee. It appears that properties are billed different amounts for this particular code.
Property Rates
The two items for residential property rates are marked off in the rectangle in fig 1. The rates are calculated on an annual basis but billed monthly. So in this example the property is valued at R1 200 000 and the tariff is 0.004672. If you multiply the two figures you get a total of R5 606.40 property rates for the year. If you divide this figure by twelve (months in the year) your monthly Property Rates bill is R467.20. The second amount in the rates rectangle is a minuscule rebate calculated in the same way as the monthly rates amount.
– Compiled by Steven Lang