Meter Wars: A Consumer Strikes Back
You challenge the accuracy of a services account from your local municipality, thus: “Your meter must be wrong, no way was my consumption that high”. The reply: “We’ve tested the meter and it works fine. Pay up or face disconnection”. Off to court you go. Can you “fight city hall” and who has to prove what? There’s good news here for consumers in a recent High Court decision in Euphorbia (Pty) Ltd t/a Gallagher Estates v City of Johannesburg (A5052/2015) [2016] ZAGPPHC 548 dealing with just such a situation. The R4.5m water claim and the disconnection A municipality installed a new water…