Ashur Properties, a manufacturing business owing City Power more than R2m, and a church owing R750,000 are among the defaulting institutions the Johannesburg electricity utility disconnected in Alexandra.
City Power embarked on an aggressive three-day revenue collection effort in the township north of Johannesburg in an attempt to recover at least R36m of R363m owed to the Alexandra Service Delivery Centre (SDC).
Targeted businesses were given pre-disconnection notices a few months ago but failed to make payment arrangements.
These include petrol stations, government institutions, manufacturing companies, government learning institutions and places of worship.
The entity’s spokesperson, Isaac Mangena, said they were hopeful they would recover at least R36m in the next few days of the operation.
He said the debt was part of the R4bn owed to the entity across the City of Johannesburg.
“We had already profiled some customers and sent them a pre-disconnection letter. Some of the businesses here, such as spaza shops, had never paid a cent since they started operating,” he said.
Officials disconnected one church which allegedly illegally connected electricity and fiddled with the meter box.
During the operation, one business was found to have bridged the meter, and another business had one, but it was not registered into City Power’s grid or billing system.
Ashur’s manager, Sylvester Joseph, disputed he owed the entity more than R2m and insisted the problem started in 2019 when the entity changed the meter.
He said the city was billing them for a meter which is not on their property. According to him, they had paid an average of R10,000 each month for electricity.
He said they had been pleading with the utility to sort out their meter problem and had spent about R200,000 on legal fees.
A stressed Joseph said the business employs about 30 people who wouldn’t have jobs after the entity cut them off.
“We don’t owe them R2m. Previously they were billing us for a meter that is not in this property. We are manufacturing outdoor lighting and electric products.
“We have an ongoing case with the City of Johannesburg (CoJ). We had numerous meetings with CoJ over the past three years, and we went to the high court, but our case was struck off the roll,” he said.
He said they would apply for an interdict to force City Power to restore their electricity.
“Unfortunately our employees will have no work, and we cannot fulfil our clients’ obligations. We are stressed,” said Joseph.
Mangena said many business enterprises across the city fiddle with the meter box to cheat the system and buy less electricity than what is used at their business premises.
“They will fiddle with the meter. They would then buy R50 power while they are using R50,000 power. On our side it shows you are buying electricity, but it is R50 and this person is running a machinery enterprise,” he said.
He said fiddling with the meter boxes was common around the city and customers end up not paying the amounts they owe.
Mangena said if they were not aware, they wouldn’t pick it up on the system that some enterprises were not paying what they are supposed to pay.
“The historic payment will show you the amount they are paying, but they are paying less compared to the kind of operation they are doing, and it is mostly small businesses.”
He said City Power was losing almost R2bn out of the non-technical issues of the R4bn they were losing from revenue collection within the city.
Mangena appealed to businesses that may have problems with their meter readings to approach them to solve the problems rather than wait for City Power to cut them off.
“Come to City Power before we come to you. If there is a problem we will send technicians to fix the problem. Often you find they are raise issues when we are about to disconnect them.
“He [Joseph] is claiming his account is in good order, but he must produce the papers. If it is in order, he would have shown us, and we would have acknowledged it and left him, but he doesn’t show us,” he said.
Central Johannesburg TVET College in Alexandra heard about the operation and rushed to settle its R900,000 bill.
However, upon arrival, technicians found their mini substation was vandalised a few days ago and cables were stolen.
The campus manager Lebogang Moalafi said they had to pay their bill after they spent days without electricity and thought the entity had disconnected them.
“We paid yesterday and submitted the proof of payment to them, but they said they they will come today to reconnect,” she said.
Over the next two days, City Power officials will be going to the heart of Alexandra to knock on the doors of customers who are defaulting, targeting businesses, hijacked buildings, government schools and hotspot areas rife with bypassed meters and illegal connections and proceed with the removal of illegal connections.
The entity will also conduct outreach programmes within communities to assist with queries and payment arrangements and to persuade defaulting customers to make payment arrangements to be spared from power supply restrictions.
TimesLIVE
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