COJ - Excessive electricity bill - Where to complain?

TheChamp

TheChamp

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The fact that residents have to somehow come up with the money to pay up while the municipality take their time to sort out mistakes like or be cut off is really not right.

I also get the feeling that the avenues for the customer to complain are heavily skewed against the customer, registering a complaint should be easy enough on a self service portal and once a complaint is registered te client should have a flat rate they pay whilethe city investigates, maybe if it affects their bottom line they will stop dragging their feet and resolve disputes much faster.
 
Aquila ka Hecate

Aquila ka Hecate

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deweyzeph said:
Even the City of Cape Town gets it wrong. I have to manually send in my water meter reading every month because the water meter readers don't allocate the correct reading to the correct meter. E.g. if you live in number 12, you get a bill for number 10's water meter, if you live in number 10 you get a bill for number 8's meter, etc.
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We had completely phantom water meters on our bills. I still suspect an illegal dodge of some sort.
 
Aquila ka Hecate

Aquila ka Hecate

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TheChamp said:
The fact that residents have to somehow come up with the money to pay up while the municipality take their time to sort out mistakes like or be cut off is really not right.

I also get the feeling that the avenues for the customer to complain are heavily skewed against the customer, registering a complaint should be easy enough on a self service portal and once a complaint is registered te client should have a flat rate they pay whilethe city investigates, maybe if it affects their bottom line they will stop dragging their feet and resolve disputes much faster.
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@surface : If you've registered a complaint, just pay what you'd normally pay on your monthly bill.
As long as you're doing that, they can't cut you off.
 
surface

surface

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Aquila ka Hecate said:
@surface : If you've registered a complaint, just pay what you'd normally pay on your monthly bill.
As long as you're doing that, they can't cut you off.
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I will actually settle the bill no matter what it is but yeah, I reckon they won't cut off as long as they get some amount every month. Fortunately, it is under 7K so it is fine. Have heard of bills in excess of 50K and that would be a real problem if that happens.
 
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deweyzeph

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Aquila ka Hecate said:
We had completely phantom water meters on our bills. I still suspect an illegal dodge of some sort.
Click to expand...

I'm so paranoid about meter readings now that I take a photograph every week of my water meter with the reading and meter number very clearly visible as well as a time stamp and geolocation meta data attached to the image. If they try to pull one over me I have all the evidence I need to prove my side of the story.
 
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deweyzeph

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Aquila ka Hecate said:
@surface : If you've registered a complaint, just pay what you'd normally pay on your monthly bill.
As long as you're doing that, they can't cut you off.
Click to expand...

As far as I know only the City of Cape Town does this, i.e. if you lodge a dispute of your bill they will accept that you pay what your average bill would be while they sort out the dispute.
 
surface

surface

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deweyzeph said:
As far as I know only the City of Cape Town does this, i.e. if you lodge a dispute of your bill they will accept that you pay what your average bill would be while they sort out the dispute.
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I think one can just pay "some" amount in COJ as well and then arrears must be reflecting in 30+ days/60+ days/90+ days column - and then you get a love letter after 90+

Just a guess.
 
Aquila ka Hecate

Aquila ka Hecate

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deweyzeph said:
I'm so paranoid about meter readings now that I take a photograph every week of my water meter with the reading and meter number very clearly visible as well as a time stamp and geolocation meta data attached to the image. If they try to pull one over me I have all the evidence I need to prove my side of the story.
Click to expand...
We do that, too.
 
Aquila ka Hecate

Aquila ka Hecate

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surface said:
I think one can just pay "some" amount in COJ as well and then arrears must be reflecting in 30+ days/60+ days/90+ days column - and then you get a love letter after 90+

Just a guess.
Click to expand...
We paid an average of our monthly bill while the water meters were being sorted out. Then they had to do a recon on the whole municpal bill - water, lights, sewerage, rates and taxes. (C of J)
 
J

Jladan

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Nov 19, 2009
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TheChamp said:
The fact that residents have to somehow come up with the money to pay up while the municipality take their time to sort out mistakes like or be cut off is really not right.

I also get the feeling that the avenues for the customer to complain are heavily skewed against the customer, registering a complaint should be easy enough on a self service portal and once a complaint is registered te client should have a flat rate they pay whilethe city investigates, maybe if it affects their bottom line they will stop dragging their feet and resolve disputes much faster.
Click to expand...

This is what I did when I got a stupid bill, Carried on paying what I normally did each month while they sorted out the complaint. They threatened to cut me off but a lawyers letter indicating my willingness and evidence of actual payment shut that down
 
PsyWulf

PsyWulf

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I've had to sort out a 50k bill,you either pay someone to go queue,or you go queue 5 hours at HO and get it sorted in 10min
 
surface

surface

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Oct 23, 2006
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No one has bothered to reply yet. Have mailed mayor's email address now. Let us see
 
Rickster

Rickster

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CoJ customer here, we are being billed R3500 for 1100KWh every month, we should really speak to someone.
 
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