Joburg billing woes

COURT: JUDGE SLAMS HANDLING OF DISPUTES AND IRREGULARITIES

- Roy Cokayne

The City of Joburg has come under fire in the High Court in Johannesburg for the way it manages municipal service account disputes, billing irregularities and decisions to disconnect services due to nonpayment of contested charges.

Acting Judge Don Mahon said in a judgment handed down on Monday to an application by two women involved in a billing dispute with the city that Joburg "bears the burden of proving the accuracy of its invoices".

Mahon said the women were not equipped to ascertain the correctness of the city's invoices because they lacked access to the internal workings and calculations underpinning the billing system.

Should the women contest the billing, the city must substantiate its claims of accuracy through a rectification process, he said.

Mahon said the rectification involved far more than a simple recalculation of a debt.