More woes for city billing system

Excessive bills, accounts not migrated, water consumption unknown

ETHEKWINI Municipality’s audit committee has highlighted many challenges with the city’s controversial billing system, describing it as unstable.

In its June 30 report, the audit committee, which analyses the departments and functions of the municipality, questioned the stability of the multibillion-rand Revenue Management System (RMS).

This contradicts how the city, in its budget statement tabled before the executive committee last week, described the billing system. In a report on financial matters, the city said that Coins, the previous billing system, had been decommissioned and was no longer used for billing.

The report also said RMS had stabilised, adding that it was the only revenue system used for billing purposes.

Touted as a cost-cutting exercise for the city, the R1 billion billing system has caused frustration among Durban ratepayers, with allegations of incorrect billing the order of the day.

In addition to the exorbitant price tag, the city came under fire last year when it emerged that it was paying consultants R1.5 million a month to run the system.

However, the audit committee’s report shows that problems with RMS persist. The report claims that as a result of challenges with RMS, RMS training or an inability to utilise the billing system, the city’s water consumption volumes had been unknown for a year. “As a result of the above, it has not been possible for the city to determine water losses for the period under review, and the financial analysis for the water unit has been hindered by the absence of legitimate water sales volume,” it said.

The audit committee’s report said more than 1 000 rates accounts had not been migrated to RMS due to the challenges associated with the data cleansing processes.

“A significant number of accounts are still being dispatched to consumers with errors,” the report said.

The report added that according to the RMS steering committee report, 11803 water meters had not been read for more than a year, and the reasons for the failure were not clear.

The audit committee recommended that a post-implementation review be performed on RMS as soon as possible.

DA councillor in Central Phoenix, Tino Pillay, said: “Just yesterday, I got a complaint from a family of four who were paying R3500, which has jumped to R5000. They wanted to know what was going on.

“I had to explain to them that the meter was being estimated and therefore they had been undercharged, and the new amount is the amount they were supposed to be paying,” he said.

ANC councillor Sifiso Mngadi, from Ward 24, said he was still receiving complaints about the billing, although they were not RMS specific.

“People will come and say their bill is high because of RMS, and others will be high because they have not been paying.”

IFP caucus leader Mdu Nkosi said the municipality should have abandoned the system a long time ago.

“It is not functioning and it is struggling to even fully migrate consumers to it. This is not the first time that the audit committee has raised complaints. This system has been a problem for years.

“We spent millions on this and yet there is no benefit for consumers; instead we have had reports from consumers that they are receiving extraordinary bills,” he said.

DA caucus leader in eThekwini Nicole Graham said the city seemed to be contradicting itself regarding RMS.

“On the one hand, we have the budget statement that says RMS is fully functional. Then we have the audit committee report which says the RMS steering committee is reporting various problems with it.

“I think it’s very clear from our interaction with the public as councillors that there are ongoing problems. Billing is still a very big mess and there are worrying signs like the fact that we are unable to track our water losses,” she said.

EThekwini chief financial officer Krish Kumar said: “The system is stable, our internal auditors are going through it now.”

He said issues arose only if people put in the wrong readings and incorrect information came out.

Kumar urged those still experiencing billing issues to approach the municipality to have them assessed.