City Power conducted a major electricity disconnection operation for defaulting customers in Midrand who currently owe the power utility R440 million. Picture: City Power (Facebook)
City Power has cut off the electricity supply of defaulting customers within the Midrand Service Delivery Centre (SDC) area, who are owing a whopping R440 million in unpaid electricity bills.
In a bid to recover a staggering debt of R9.8 billion, the power utility conducted a major disconnection operation targeting businesses, residential complexes and large power users (LPUs).
The operation was in line with the Johannesburg metro’s drive to collect a ballooned debt in unpaid municipal services by defaulting customers this month.
Last Thursday, City Power disconnected the electricity supply of a government building housing the Pan-African Parliament (Pap), and a construction company, which collectively owe an unsettled debt of R28m.
Among major defaulters in Midrand, two residential complexes in Sagewood and Erand Gardens that collectively owe R8.8m saw their electricity disconnected, as did a hotel in Halfway House owing more than R4m in unpaid electricity, another hotel which owes over R45m, and an engineering solution enterprise in Midridge Park with a staggering R1.1m debt.
City Power spokesperson, Isaac Mangena, said the power utility had restored to two level three disconnections, “by removing infrastructure such as circuit breakers and fuses to prevent two defaulting LPUs from illegal re-connections for owing almost R6m collectively”.
Mangena said City Power was clamping down on defaulting customers who continuously reconnected electricity illegally. He warned customers that illegal re-connections will not be tolerated.
“To combat this rising issue, City Power is actively engaging law enforcement agencies to arrest defaulters who illegally reconnect their power supply themselves, as this act constitutes as tempering with essential infrastructure - a criminal offence. Additionally, the entity is exploring implementing stricter measures for customers who repeatedly fail to honour their payment agreements,” said Mangena.
So far, in the past quarter, City Power successfully recovered over R2bn in revenue, said Mangena.
“Despite facing challenges from defaulters, City Power’s revenue collection efforts have yielded significant results. This is demonstrating the commitment of many customers to fulfil their financial obligations for the services they use daily.”
He urged customers to refrain from defaulting on their municipal services. “We call on our domestic and business customers to do the right thing and pay for their services. Customers should visit our SDCs across the city to update their accounts and make payment arrangements.
“The disconnection drives remain our last resort as we would rather foster a mutually beneficial relationship of quality service provision to the residents made possible by the payment of services,” said Mangena.
The Star
hope.mafu@inl.co.za