Pretoria - The City of Tshwane has urged customers to pay their municipal accounts electronically, following strike action by the SA Post Office.
The city urged customers to register on its e-service, which is a secure online service that allows property owners, companies, property managing agents and tenants to register for free. Once registered, customers can view, download and pay for all utilities accounts electronically from the comfort of their homes.
This week, the City of Tshwane advised its customers of the city-wide delay in the posting of municipal accounts due to the on-going strike by post office employees.
There are several advantages offered by paying using the e-Tshwane service (www.e-tshwane.co.za) which include:
- Receiving an immediate confirmation of the payment instruction via the service, followed by proof of payment and a payment receipt once the payment has been confirmed successful by your bank;
- The proof of payment is saved in your payment history and is available to customers and the municipality in the event of any payment-related issues/disputes;
- Payments made via the service are reconciled and allocated against a customer’s account, eliminating any possibility of incorrect allocations or lost payments; and
- Payments made via other facilities can take up to 14 days to reflect on your municipal account, whereas this delay is removed for payments made via the Tshwane service, eliminating the risk of unwanted actions by the municipality, even when you have paid.
Launched late last year, approximately 20 000 accounts have been registered to date with the number increasing daily.
“The city hopes that the post office strike will jolt customers to register for a speedy, efficient, better and hassle-free e-service,” said the city on Friday.
The city reminded residents of their responsibility to p ay their accounts even if no statement has been received.
Alternatively, residents can receive duplicate invoices at all City of Tshwane walk-in customer care centres. Invoices will only be emailed to residents if the City of Tshwane has their email addresses on record in the system, while SMSes will only be sent if customers have already given their cell phone numbers to the vity.
“The City of Tshwane apologises to all its customers who have been adversely affected by these delays,” it said. - SAnews.gov.za
