{"id":864373,"date":"2026-06-24T12:59:52","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T10:59:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=864373"},"modified":"2026-06-24T12:59:55","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T10:59:55","slug":"major-pain-hitting-households-in-south-africa-next-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/864373\/major-pain-hitting-households-in-south-africa-next-week\/","title":{"rendered":"Major pain hitting households in South Africa next week"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

South African households will face higher rates and tax tariffs for electricity, water and sanitation, refuse removal and property rates starting from July 1, 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) approved electricity tariff increases of 8.76% for Eskom’s direct customers and 9.01% for municipal customers for the 2026\/27 financial year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This decision adds further pressure on businesses that are already struggling with rising operating and logistics costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durban and surrounds in KwaZulu-Natal, under the eThekwini Municipality, will face the biggest hike in rates and taxes, with electricity tariffs surging to 9%, higher than both Cape Town and Johannesburg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, water tariffs for eThekwini Municipality will increase by 12%, while refuse removal will increase by 9.5% and sanitation by 8%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The eThekwini Municipality’s significant tariff increase is attributed to external bulk supply increases from Eskom and uMngeni-uThukela Water, as well as the need to repair and upgrade the city’s ageing and flood-damaged infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Johannesburg residents, electricity has increased by 8.63%, down from 12.7% in 2025\/2026. Water tariffs will also increase by 12.5% for Johannesburg residents, while sanitation will increase by 11%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The City of Cape Town will see a 6.7% increase in electricity tariffs, which the City said is due to the higher cost of purchasing electricity from Eskom (9.01% NERSA increase).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Significantly, Cape Town will face a 10.2% decrease in the Residential Rate-in-the-Rand applied to property rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The city will also face a 4.5% increase in water and sanitation tariffs, which are grouped together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The City of Cape Town said that the increase in water and sanitation tariffs is mainly due to the “expansive capital investment costs and demand on key operational items.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To add to this pressure, consumer price inflation climbed to 4.5% in May, up from 4.0% in April. This increase marks the highest rate since July 2024, when it reached 4.6%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply (CIPS) Southern Africa Regional Managing Director Paul Vos said that energy uncertainty has not disappeared but rather that it has evolved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The impact is being felt across supplier networks. Electricity tariffs continue to rise above inflation, while fuel costs remain a major concern for transport, logistics and backup generation requirements,” said Vos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This creates a double cost pressure. Suppliers are facing higher energy costs and higher logistics costs simultaneously. As a result, procurement teams are seeing greater pricing volatility, more requests for contract adjustments and increased pressure on budgets,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Below is a table that shows the changes in tariffs for 2026\/2027 for each major metro.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rate<\/strong><\/th>Joburg<\/strong><\/th>Cape Town<\/strong><\/th>eThekwini<\/strong><\/th>Tshwane<\/strong><\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Electricity<\/td>8.6%<\/td>6.7%<\/td>9.0%<\/td>8.8%<\/td><\/tr>
Water<\/td>12.5%<\/td>4.5%*<\/td>12.0%<\/td>10.0%<\/td><\/tr>
Sanitation<\/td>11.0%<\/td>4.5%*<\/td>8.0%<\/td>5.0%<\/td><\/tr>
Refuse removal<\/td>6.2%<\/td>3.8%<\/td>9.5%<\/td>4.1%<\/td><\/tr>
Property rates<\/td>3.6%<\/td>-10.2%<\/td>2.0%<\/td>5.0%<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

*Note: The City of Cape Town considers a collective increase of 4.50% for water and sanitation as they are grouped together.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

City of Ekurhuleni late to the party<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One of the biggest metros in Gauteng, the City of Ekurhuleni, has now also passed its budget, laying out the rate changes residents can expect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After failing to pass its budget three times before, the city council finally managed to pass the budget with the support of the Democratic Alliance (DA) and ANC this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This came with significant concessions from the ANC to get the DA on board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the DA, the concessions include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  • Reducing property rate increases to just 1.5% – among the lowest in South Africa.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Ring-fencing infrastructure spending so that money cannot simply be diverted away from roads, electricity, water and sanitation.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Establishing an Electricity Protection Unit to combat illegal connections and electricity theft.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Publishing monthly service delivery dashboards so residents can measure performance.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Freezing luxury spending and focusing expenditure on essential services.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • \u2060Strengthening consequence management and improving oversight of finances and governance.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    The city was running on an exceptionally tight deadline, being required to pass the budget before the new financial year kicks off on 1 July.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The budget carried the following increases for the city:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      \n
    • Electricity:<\/strong> 9% increase<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Water:<\/strong> 11% increase<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Sanitation:<\/strong> 8.4% increase<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Refuse: <\/strong>3.4% increase<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      Before the deal was struck, property rates were expected to increase by 2%, which will now be reduced to 1.5%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      The reduced rate should save residents around R74 million, against the overall budget of approximately R70 billion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      South African households will face higher rates and tax tariffs starting from July 1, 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":786148,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874,23],"tags":[25640,24443,7530],"class_list":["post-864373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","category-government","tag-chartered-institute-of-procurement-supply-cips-southern-africa","tag-consumer-price-index-cpi","tag-inflation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864373","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=864373"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864373\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":864510,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864373\/revisions\/864510"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/786148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=864373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=864373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=864373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}