For the past nine months, Charmaine Cechich has been using free electricity and she is not pleased with that. “Eskom complains that municipalities owe them money, I’m sure it’s because of things like this,” said Cechich.
She said her prepaid meter stopped working in February. In an effort to try and have it fixed, City Power officers bypassed her electricity to the municipality. “The person who helped me told me that they will bypass my electricity and I will get free electricity until such time that they bring me another meter,” she explained.
Though she is not paying for her electricity at the moment, Cechich is concerned that she might receive a surprising bill once her meter is reconnected. “I’m a pensioner, I won’t be able to pay a lump sum of bill should it be brought here.”
The other point she raised is that she has always been a responsible citizen and doesn’t want to owe the municipality. “Unfortunately, it’s the municipality making it impossible for us to pay our dues.”
She added that when the officials came to bypass the electricity at her house, they had a big book with a number of households whose electricity had been bypassed.”Imagine how much revenue the municipality is losing with this electricity that they give freely to people because they can’t fix their prepaid meters.”
Cechich said she has on several times went to City Power to ask on the progress with getting her new meter but she is always sent back. “They told me that once my meter is ready, they will bring it to my house and I should just sit and wait for that.”
Cechich has been on a prepaid meter since 2010 and it never gave her problems. “I was one of the lucky few members who had the meters installed free of charge by the municipality.” She started having problems with the meter in July last year. “The meter would stop working for a few days, I will be without power for a few days and it will start working again.” While trying to resolve the matter in December last year, she was told that there were too many applicants and she should just carry on with the faulty meter. In February, that was when the meter stopped working completely. Her electricity was bypassed and she has not been paying for her electricity since then. City Power is still to respond to questions sent to them.
