Cape Town saying goodbye to the Post Office

The City of Cape Town (CoCT) will stop sending printed municipal bills to residents and businesses via the South African Post Office at the end of the year.

In a statement on 13 February 2025, the metro announced its years-long paperless billing campaign had resulted in over 430,000 accounts receiving their bills by email.

“We’ve made a lot of progress over the years with reducing the number of bills we print and send via the postal service. However, we are stepping up our efforts to switch to emailed accounts,” the city said.

“In an effort to move almost all accounts to emailed bills, the city will no longer send printed bills via the South African Postal Service after 31 December 2025.”

Mayoral committee member for finance, Siseko Mbandezi, said it was important for the metro to reduce the risk associated with using the South African postal service and bills not being delivered.

“Emailed accounts make it easy for account holders to keep track of their bills, and use the accounts for proof of residence,” Mbandezi said.

“Saving on printing and postage also contributes to a more financially and environmentally sustainable organisation.”

To switch from physical posted mail to email, municipal account holders must send a request to the city, either with an email to [email protected] or SMS to 31223.

The message must include an account number and email address for receiving future bills.

The city said it was going paperless from 2026 but would assist all account holders with no email access.

“They are advised to call the City’s Call Centre so that we know about them and can help them,” the city said.

The paperless drive for municipal accounts is one of several initiatives the CoCT has undertaken to become more tech-savvy in recent years.

For example, in August 2024 it launched a pump station control room to remotely monitor the performance of its water and sanitation infrastructure in real time.

In addition, it has one of the most tech-heavy law enforcement ecosystems — including a vast CCTV network with automatic numberplate recognition technology.

Its metro police department is also equipped with body and vehicle cameras, drones, and an “Eye-in-the-sky” information, surveillance, and reconnaissance plane.

The metro also offers an online registration system for small-scale embedded generators (SSEGs) via its e-Services portal.