The City of Johannesburg is going on a door-to-door campaign to educate its customers about paying their accounts on time and to resolve any queries.
The City’s Spokesperson, Kgamanyane Maphologela said the campaign would start on 14 June in Region E (Bryanston, Sandton, Kew, Bramley, Houghton Estate and Sandhurst) and would focus on customers who have not responded to the City’s request to pay their accounts.
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Maphologela said, “The City has launched the programme in a bid to be pro-active and engage customers on a one-to-one basis, over and above visiting customers and discussing the importance of paying their accounts consistently, on time and in full. We would also use the opportunity to do data cleansing whereby we would update the customer’s details and seek to resolve some of their queries.”
Maphologela said the City would spend two days in Region E interacting with customers and the campaign might be extended to other regions.
“Many customers assume that while they still have pending queries or have not received their monthly statements they should stop paying for the services they consume. According to Section 8.2 of the policy, which states that although the City of Johannesburg must render an account for the amount due by a debtor, failure thereof shall not relieve a debtor of the obligation to pay this amount,” he said.
Officials will also be assisting customers who are unable to pay their municipal accounts due to financial reasons. Such customers will be assisted to sign an Acknowledgement of Debt, where they would be able to pay a determined amount they can afford.
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“We want to move away from simply cutting off the customers’ services such as water and electricity and we will also be assisting with a lifestyle assessment to determine affordability with regards to their outstanding debt.”
For more information call the City’s call centre on 0860 Joburg (562 874) to find alternative Customer Service Centres, or visit the City’s website www.joburg.org.za for more information.
