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Yeukai Karengezeka and Sallomy Matare
The Harare Residents Trust (HRT) has called on Government to intervene in the billing crisis at the Harare City Council amid fears that the delays in putting in place a proper system will see residents incurring huge bills.

Council has been doing manual billing for the past three months since the abrupt disconnection of the BIQ system following disagreements with the provider. Under the current setup council cannot provide ratepayers with details on their accounts such as balances and updates on payments they have made. HRT director Mr Precious Shumba said it was taking council too long to resolve the issue.

“The shutdown of the BIQ billing system from March 21, 2019 has continued to date,” he said. “Ratepayers who are making payments are being issued with receipts generated offline because the city has no access to the system, hence history of bill payments cannot be retrieved. It means that during this shutdown, the City of Harare management and those in the IT Department can easily manipulate the financial management and reporting system.”

Mr Shumba said it was vital for the city to have an operational billing system to avoid pilferage.

More to follow…