Harare City Council (HCC) has revealed that it is currently collating the October to December bills which will be issued to ratepayers as a single bill.
The local government authority’s Harare City Council principal communications officer Mr Innocent Ruwende told The Sunday Mail that the process was delayed by the input of new tariffs introduced by the supplementary budget.
HCC chairperson of the finance and development committee, Councillor Luckson Mukunguma, spoke to the Sunday Mail encouraging residents to pay their bills for the delivery of services they desire. He said:
Those bills will be lumped together so that residents can receive the current ones quickly. During this time, there has been resentment and resistance to pay bills. We are getting between $12 million and $15 million as opposed to $45 million per month.
We encourage residents to keep paying their bills and keep their receipts so that they can reconcile them with the bills when they finally come.
The council’s revenue collection system has been criticised for being a soft spot for revenue leakage and Harare Residents Trust Director, Precious Shumba urged the city fathers to re-engage Quill Associates, the BIQ system developers, to address the billing challenges.
More: The Sunday Mail