The Democratic Alliance is the official opposition in the City of Johannesburg

The Johannesburg Billings Crisis

Introduction

The emergence of a ‘Billings Crisis’ was not a surprise to the members of the DA’s Johannesburg Caucus, especially those serving on the Finance Committee, when it finally broke loose.

In Section 79 committee meetings as well as in Council, in speeches and submissions, some of which have been carried in the media, the DA in Johannesburg has been warning of this scenario for some time, although the scale and the magnitude was a matter of conjecture as all reports presented before the Finance Section 79 had not provided the slightest clue that the problem had affected almost 8% of the City’s 1.3-million accounts.

The following timeline serves as a guide to the development of the problem.

Timeline

2005: Project Phakama initiated and approved by Johannesburg City Council at a cost of R270-million and awarded to Masana Technologies, a new BEE company. It later transpires (Mail & Guardian 10/2/2011) that Masana directors were employees of the City at the time.

2008: In July/August, Masana is liquidated and the project handed over to the joint control of IBM and Dimension Data. At this point, the scope of work is now expanded and cost skyrockets to well over R800-million.

2009: The Project Phakama implementation now handed over solely to IBM.

2009: In July, Project Phakama is rolled out to western suburbs first for testing. Problems are immediately detected and supposedly corrected.

2010: Notwithstanding the faulty system, a full data migration of the rest of Johannesburg’s accounts is undertaken in October/November. At this stage, the cost of the project is well in excess of R870-million.

2010: Noting that there appear to be serious flaws with the system, DA Johannesburg Leader Vasco da Gama, Finance Shadow MMC Patrick Atkinson and Finance Section 79 Committee Member John Mendelsohn request meeting with Finance MMC Parks Tau to discuss Project Phakama and the reports of incorrect bills that are beginning to flood in. The meeting is agreed to, and then postponed twice in succession by Tau. To date, this meeting has not taken place.

2010: On December 8th, the DA requests urgent debate on the billings issue in Council. This is turned down by the Speaker as “not urgent”.

2010: During the Council recess, almost 41,000 account holders have their services disconnected, many of which are for inaccurate and vastly inflated bills.

2011: In January, in contact with the media, the DA is responsive, available and supplies much of the information used by the press and radio to highlight this issue. DA spokespeople including Cllrs da Gama, Atkinson and Mendelsohn appear on radio shows, are quoted widely in the press, and appear on Carte Blanche. Simultaneously, the DA’s Johannesburg caucus sets up a task team to deal with individual ratepayers’ bills by taking these matters up with the Revenue Department’s VIP section.

2011: On January 27th, the DA again requests an urgent debate on the Billings Crisis. This is granted by the Speaker. The media are alerted in advance on the debate, and the Council Meeting is attended by journalists from all the major newspapers, SABC radio and Radio 702/Cape Talk.

The Johannesburg Caucus has a clearly defined media strategy and media protocol. Our policy is not to criticise without proposing a clear solution, and where possible, assist the media to drive an issue. The billings crisis was handled exactly according to this strategy with commensurate benefits, both in terms of media coverage and DA credibility among the media corps but also in terms of voter support.

The media coverage as a result of a concerted and well-executed campaign by the Johannesburg Caucus Management Team (CMT) together with the Cllrs Atkinson and Mendelsohn generated a considerable amount of media coverage, both before the Council debate, where information was drip-fed to the media and used by them; as well as post-debate, where the coverage on the issue actually rivalled the President’s state of the nation address for coverage (excluding TV).

Google: “Billings Crisis Johannesburg DA”

About 11,700 results (0.37 seconds)

In addition to broadcast media, the print media the following day carried several editorial leaders including The Star, The Citizen, Business Day, The Times and City Press. The Mail & Guardian carried a lead story on the crisis the following Thursday, and even the Sunday Times too carried the story. As a fitting tribute to his incompetent leadership, the Mayor was honoured with the “Mampara of the Week” title.

The following week, the DA in Johannesburg released our 9th annual Mayoral Scorecard, which similarly generated massive publicity. Google it and you will see the extent of same.

A Google search using the search key words “Billings Crisis, Johannesburg and DA” yields 11,700 results, ranging from the Business Day, City Press, Cape Times, Argus, Fin24, Mail and Guardian, ITWeb, PoliticsWeb – the list is endless. A cursory glance at the comments pages of the online editions reveals a populace determined to exercise their democratic right and vote – and vote for the DA. The comments are overwhelmingly positive.

Looking Ahead

Since 2009, the Johannesburg caucus has been operating with a singular vision in mind: To take control of Johannesburg in the 2011 local government elections. It is a vision that underpins all we do, and has a set of policies and procedures at its foundation that speak to the realisation of this vision.

Our recently completed Manifesto, which sets out our plans for the city, reveals a party that is ‘Ready to Govern’. To highlight a passage from this document:

To protect and maintain the integrity of Johannesburg’s financial health in a sustainable manner that allows the city to deliver quality levels of services to all Johannesburg’s people, the DA will treat the resolution of the billing crisis as an absolute priority.

The DA will ensure all necessary requirements to ensure fair and accurate billing as laid down in law and in Council’s own policies are introduced and effected. Where mistakes do occur, speedy and accurate query resolution will be a priority.

To resolve the backlog of queries and deal with any new issues that may arise, within the first 100 days of a DA administration, a Special Emergency Contact Line will be set up to deal with any of Johannesburg’s people who have received a bill more than three times larger than the average amount usually paid. We will ensure that a proper and functioning query procedure is in place within 100 days after taking control of Johannesburg, and that customer queries are responded to within 7 days.

The DA will ensure that the Joburg Connect Call Centre is operational 24 hours a day. Currently dysfunctional for the most part, Joburg Connect must serve the needs of all Johannesburg’s people. We would ensure proper staffing of the call centre and “fit for purpose” management to ensure the operation is professional and smooth. Proper training of all staff in the call centre, including in Customer Relationship Management, will quickly be implemented so they are able to effectively and courteously serve Johannesburg’s people. All links between the call centre and the back office where query resolution takes place will operate as effectively as possible.

We will initiate a thorough and independent review of systemic and accounting problems inherent in Johannesburg’s new SAP system and an aggressive course of action will be followed to ensure these are resolved. A similar exercise was followed in Cape Town in 2006 when the new DA administration took over and proved to be very successful in resolving the problems associated with their SAP system.

The DA will put in place a team of accountants, similar to the route followed by SARS in the late 1990s, who will be given nine months to significantly reduce the R10,6-billion debt owing to the Johannesburg. Most of this team’s collection will be used to reduce Johannesburg’s overall debt burden, reducing annual interest charges payable by Johannesburg and freeing more money for service delivery.

Looking ahead, we will continue to closely monitor the ‘Billings Crisis’, asking questions in the Section 79 Finance Committee and in Council to assess the effectiveness of the measures implemented by the city. We will also report on same, and brief the media with information as and when it becomes available. Should an issue arise further, we will act on it immediately.

Frankly speaking, the city and its spokespeople have gotten off the ropes and implemented a series of measures aimed at rectifying the billings crisis. Included in this is a halt to service disconnections; the appointment of a team of 60 dedicated staff to deal with billings issues and discrepancies; an email address for residents to report issues (statements@joburg.org.za); a commitment that a staff member will call everyone whose account is in dispute to resolve it; and still encouraging people to call in to Joburg Connect to log a call – not expect a resolution immediately but to log a call.

Should any resident not be able to get a satisfactory solution to a billing problem while the city is implementing its corrective measures, the DA Johannesburg’s task team will continue to address individual accounts to assist in resolving these on behalf of our people. Please direct individual billing problems to peegee@icon.co.za or johnjay@telkomsa.net where these will be taken up on your behalf.

In our own way, we will, as and where we can, continue to serve the people of Johannesburg in any way we can, and in so doing, highlight the differences that exists between DA administered municipalities like Cape Town and the chaos that is Johannesburg today, because where we govern, we do it better.

“Everywhere the DA governs, we do it better!”

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