AN Umgeni Park resident, who received a threatening SMS from the eThekwini Municipality, is trying to get down to the bottom of how it actually transpired.
Murray Hawkesworth said the SMS stated that he owed the City 1c and if he did not cough up the cash, legal action would be taken against him or he would be disconnected.
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“The first thing I thought was that we don’t even have 1c in our currency anymore, so who in their right mind sent this SMS? Then I checked if the account number on the SMS matched mine and, it did. I am aware of all these SMS scams going around so I didn’t respond to the message. I marked it as spam, however, the network messaged me back saying the sender was not spam,” he said.
Hawkesworth added that he had never been in arrears for any of his bills and always paid the full amount on time, all of which he has documented proof of.
“Coming from the commerce industry, one thing I never do is miss payments or pay late. My bills are up-to-date, I am never in arrears and my accounts are paid on time every month,” he said.
A few things crossed his mind after receiving the SMS – one of which was to visit the rates office and pay the ‘outstanding account’ with a R200 note and then ask for R199.99c change, he told Northglen News with a chuckle.
“I then learnt that a friend of mine had also received the same SMS which means this was intentional. These SMSs cost money. The City is falling apart, yet money is being wasted on senseless SMSs,” he said.
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Another Durban North resident, Winnie Krige, said her son had also received an SMS last Friday demanding that his bill of 1c be paid.
“I was shocked, and my son nearly had a heart attack, but I have lived in this country long enough to know that this was a mistake. Also, our bills are paid on time and in full each and every month,” she said.
Krige, who also comes from a commerce background, said she immediately emailed two contacts at the lights department asking them for answers, but to date, she has not received a response.
“I have no idea what the City was thinking, wasting money and resources sending these messages out. They could argue that it was automated but somebody had to physically type it into the system and then disseminate the message to ratepayers. What a waste of time and money,” she said.
The Ward 34 councillor, Shontel de Boer says, “Some residents have received SMS messages from the eThekwini Municipality, threatening to cut off supply to their homes for an outstanding balance of 1 cent.
“It is absolutely ludicrous that residents whose accounts are up to date are being threatened. Their municipal bills reflect no outstanding amount, and they are receiving these outrageous messages.”
“It costs the municipality more to send out these messages than 1 cent. Why waste our ratepayers’ money like this? This seems to be a scare tactic targeting ratepayers of this city. I will not sit back and allow the municipality to bully and instil fear into residents,” she added.
City responds
eThekwini Municipality’s head of communications Lindiwe Khuzwayo said the SMS message, as well as the message at the bottom of all utility bills, is a computer-generated one that is sent out automatically when a customer is owing, regardless of the amount.
“The message is meant to remind customers that they must keep their accounts up to date. We apologise if it may have caused alarm. Customers whose accounts are up to date may ignore it. We will look at how we can have the system only send the message to those in arrears,” she said.
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