Joburg's 'billing glitches will damage inner city' : Property News .

Joburg's 'billing glitches will damage inner city'

If Joburg's billing system, which has reached "crisis point", does not improve, regeneration of its inner city will labor to a halt.

So says Renney Plit, the chair of the Property Owners and Managers Association (Poma), who claims that building owners in the interior city are owed millions because of bureaucratic bungling in the revenue department.

He only is owed R12 million by the Metropolis of Joburg in overpaid monies over the preceding two years.

One of the principal problems, says Plit, is that property developers that are buying up old and derelict office buildings and converting them into residential units, continue to be billed commercial tariffs for rates, water and electricity, which are often higher than residential ones.

Electricity is 70 percent higher for commercial use.

"We have occupancy certificates, issued by the council, which indicate that the buildings are residential, but they proceed to notice us business rates. We've had several meetings with city officials and they promised to grant us a discount of 40 percent in 2006, but this has not happened."

Officials told Poma that they would deliver to ship out inspectors to determine whether the buildings were residential, and but once that was done could the residential rebate kick in. This has not happened, Plit says.

"Many of the smaller property developers are leaving to go under if this situation continues and this is leaving to be a blow for the city."

Another problem is the huge interim readings being charged to building owners, despite readings being taken each month by independent meter readers and submitted to the council.

In some buildings, Plit has had interim readings for 12 months, which is against the city's own by-laws. Only six months of interim readings are allowed.

Unresolved billing problems are slowing down the issue of clearance certificates and so holding up the upgrading of buildings.

Plit says there are other key issues that the metropolis has to cope with, but billing has become the most important.

Requests to the metropolis for comment remained unanswered.

At a recent press briefing, City of Joburg head of finance Parks Tau said there were teething problems because of the initiation of a new computer system.

He promised that these would be solved by December.

The Star

Posted at 10:38AM Nov 05, 2010by Editor in Cities and Towns |Comments[3]