The City of Johannesburg says its new tariff increases have taken effect this week – reduced from the original proposed percentages “to cushion residents from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent national lockdown”.<\/p>\n
The enforcement of the new tariffs comes after the Johannesburg Council recently approved the metropolitan\u2019s 2020\/21 Budget, Tariffs and the Integrated Development Plan (IDP) following a delay in the approval of the budget.<\/p>\n
The City said it took a decision to reduce the initially proposed property rate from 4.9% to 4%, the water tariff dropped from a proposed 8.6% to 6.6% and the proposed 8.10% increase for electricity has been reduced to 6.23%.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the City said it also took a decision to withdraw the proposed fixed charges of R200 for residential pre-paid electricity and the R400 for commercial.<\/p>\n
The business rate ratio has been reduced from 1:2.6 to 1:2.5.<\/p>\n
The recent budget approval delay resulted in the billing system being briefly suspended for rebooting to launch a new financial year with the updated tariffs.<\/p>\n
The delayed system transition into a new financial year, which falls within the ongoing Covid-19 lockdown, saw billing only commence two working days after the Johannesburg Council\u2019s approvals.<\/p>\n
“Therefore, ratepayers are advised that billing for the month of July will subsequently be delayed, and no penalties will be imposed on ratepayers in this regard.<\/p>\n
“The pre-termination of service notices that were issued since the beginning of the lockdown will also not be executed in-line with the Covid-19 regulations not to cut off municipal services during the period,” it said.<\/p>\n