Joburg mom faces bankruptcy over R2.9-million water bill
Experts say a leak this size on her property is unlikely, while the City insists on 50% payment before engaging in dispute resolution
Jenny-Lee Bot faces possible liquidation after getting a series of water bills averaging R250,000 per month. Photo: Seth Thorne
- A Johannesburg mother-of-two has a utility bill of close to R3-million, almost all of it water charges.
- Several experts have indicated that the bill must be an error; there is simply no way a house can use that much water and not show signs of flooding.
- But despite legal action, speaking to councillors and Members of Parliament, Bot cannot get the City of Johannesburg or Johannesburg Water to rectify the problem.
Jenny-Lee Bot rents out a house in Dainfern, Johannesburg. The income from the property is needed to support her family. In 2023, she got the shock of her life when she received her utility bill: water charges had increased from R1,334 due end of July to R454,192 due end of August.
This astronomical charge was based on a recorded consumption of nearly 6,000 kilolitres, a volume a professional plumber notes is “nearly impossible” for a residential unit in a single month. The huge charges continued for months. Bot’s water bill now exceeds R2.9-million.
In Gauteng, water consumption averages 279 litres per person per day. For a family of four, this is about 34kl per month.
Although a minor repair to a small pipe connector leak was carried out in February 2024, the extreme readings persisted, fluctuating between 1,420kl and 5,965kl, averaging a quarter-of-a-million rand monthly.
Then, the readings returned to normal without any major intervention. From June 2024 onward, consumption dropped to normal usage: between 10kl and 35kl per month.
The City of Johannesburg has maintained that the high consumption was due to an “internal leak,” placing the financial burden squarely on Bot. Johannesburg Water, in a message to GroundUp, also blamed the problem on Bot.
However, independent investigations contradict this.
“On a 1,000 square metre stand, the volume of water the bill shows is 5.965-million litres in one month. But you would see signs, swamp, sink holes, wet walls, mud patches and running water - none of which I can find. So the 12 months of high water bills make no sense,” said Simon Bird from SAB Plumbing.
An engineer consulted by Bot found that this was “clearly a case of either water meter failure, incorrect reading of the water meter and/or … miscalculation by the administrator of the water bill invoices”.
In May 2024, Alpha Plumbing conducted a high-pressure gas test, certifying the “absolute absence of any active leaks” on the property.
Yet the City insists on a 50% upfront payment before engaging in any formal dispute resolution.
Johannesburg Water told us that the “request to adjust account due to high consumption” had not been processed, as “there was [an] internal leak which was owner’s responsibility”. The company said there was “high consumption” on the property between 21 March 2023 and 16 April 2024, and this had not been fixed by a Johannesburg Water technical team, so the account could not be adjusted. But this claim is inconsistent with the expert reports as well as with the fact that Bot’s bill only started ballooning several months later.
Sections of two municipal bills that Bot’s rental business has received: over R477,000 due end of August 2023 and over R2.9-million due end of April.
Faced with a bill she cannot pay, Bot is at risk of going bankrupt.
“I lose sleep over this matter, and it is insane that such a huge mistake can put me in liquidation if I cannot find a remedy,” Bot told GroundUp.
Bot says she has been pushed from “pillar to post” these past two years. She has made dozens of visits to Johannesburg Water, had meetings with lawyers, councillors and even MPs, and written to Johannesburg’s Ombudsman.
At one point, she even paid the City for a meter test. But she says she the test never actually took place.
Bot also alleges corruption – she says that during her desperate search for a solution, Johannesburg Water officials told her it would be “very expensive,” but they could make the bill “go away”.
Financial toll
The repeated service disconnections caused by the dispute led to her tenants cancelling their lease.
This loss of income resulted in a final demand from her bank and a lawyer’s letter, threatening her with liquidation.
In 2024, Bot obtained a court interdict to keep the lights and water on. But, the City subcontracts disconnections, and the order has not been honoured, according to Bot, and disconnections continue.
She cannot afford to spend much on lawyers.
The utility company has a history of faulty meter readings, particularly following the 2008 Project Phakama centralisation. Errors have been the result of a lack of physical readings, causing many households to be billed for months or even years based on arbitrary estimates.
“I honestly feel like I’m in a nightmare,” said Bot. “It’s too much stress.”
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Letters
Dear Editor
I am one of the stressed residents of the City of Johannesburg.
My water woes started in 2009. My bills went from R1,400 overnight (electricity and water) to R6,000. I paid up. Again in 2011, there was another spike from R3,400 to R16,000 in a week. I went to Braamfontein, reconciled and paid. There was a balance of R2,500. My pay day was 11 days away. By the time payday came, I paid the R2,500, only to get a call that I owed close to R19,000 in just 11 days. I protested, but the City ignored me.
By 2020, my water bill was close to R300k. I paid R45k in June, and the bill just kept climbing. By 2022, my bill was approaching R400k despite the monthly R4,000 payments. After numerous notices to switch off services and being scammed by City contractors, I decided to just pay up. I sold cars and increased the money paid over to the City from R4k per month to R6k. Threats came, I tried to reason. The city ignored me. No water meter readings, no relief, no constructive engagement. Just threats, sleepless nights, resentment and sickness.
To date, I pay R8k per month for an average water monthly consumption of R600. Yes R8k. My bill is now just over R80k. I made peace with it. In order for my house to remain under my family, I pay the City for water I never consumed. There is no leak. I closed my pool in 2014. Yet the city extorts money from me.
Dear Editor
This is insanity, but we thank you for sharing the stories.
This is impossible, and the fact that they are forcing her to pay some amount before reconsidering sounds like blatant extortion. I hope people with money can stop looking at the lower class as beneath them, because they are protesting what the rich will slowly become if they don't hold people accountable. The middle class could once survive comfortably, but now the middle class is the new poor.
Dear Editor
I read with interest the article by Seth Thorne that this Joburg resident had received a bill for 6 Ml of water in one month.
Apparently, this was on a property of 1 000m2 in area. This amount of water would cover this property to a depth of 6m. If it were evenly distributed over 30 days and deposited 200 kl of water per day, and leaked away, it would cover the area to a depth of 200mm of water every day. This is an enormous amount of water.
The typical pipe feeding a residential home is a 25mm pipe or a 32mm pipe. If this ran without any restrictions, the 32mm pipe could supply about 141 kl of water per day, and the 25mm pipe could supply about 86 kl of water per day. This is theoretically possible. However, it would immediately cause a massive sinkhole.
It is thus my considered opinion as a professional engineer that 200 kl leakage is not possible, and that even 86 kl leakage is most improbable but theoretically possible.
Dear Editor
I had a similar problem as Ms Bot, I tried everything!
But mine was a R25 000 problem, unlike her R2 million bill. The people who ultimately got the City of Joburg to look at the facts in my case were people at the Public Protector. They got my issue resolved within 3 months. Ms Bot must contact the Public Protector asap!
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