I got home last night and Ekurheleni Metropolitan Municipality had left me a little love letter in my gate.
Yip, you guessed it - a notice to say that our Water and Lights had been cut off with immediately effect coz we hadn’t paid the bill.
WTF??I mean, honestly!
We paid this account two days ago, get your fucking records straight!
So, I tried to phone their Customer Call Centre which is an automated answering service (which I detest). I want to speak to a person - a body - not a machine.
Anyhoo, I hang on listening to the android speaking skank talking to me like I'm a toddler and telling me to press 1 for after hours Call Centre Service. I follow her instructions and obediently press 1.
I wait.
I wait some more.
Then I wait some fucking more.
Nothing!
No irritating plinky-plonk hold music on loop, no marketing voice promoting shit I don't need, just a dead line!
I did this several times before I gave up.
I'm sorry to say we ate MacDonalds by candle light (so romantic), we all bathed in one bath because we had no hot water and went to bed early without having my weekly dose of Idols. I couldn't even make a cuppa tea! I was in a major huff.
So, this morning I had to physically take my proof of payment down to the Ekurheleni Metropolitan Municipality before they would agree to switch my power back on.
WTF?
Does it make sense to cut someone’s water and lights if they’ve paid? Shouldn’t we be given a few days’ grace (even though we DID pay ON TIME)?
Now I’m fucking seriously irritated!
They are very quick to switch your power off for an alleged unpaid bill but when you’ve accidentally overpaid them or if they’ve over-charged you in their error, you wait a thousands years before they either sort it out or die a long and slow death waiting for a refund.
I detest bad service – can you tell its one of my pet hates?
Standing in the neverending queue today, all I heard were mostly women bitching and moaning about errors and incorrect charges…I’m glad I wasn't the only one that felt this way, but fuck people where is your customer service?
You claim to be "The Smart, Creative and Developmental City".