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Computerization of water bills payment system reduces burden for consumers
2006-01-03 08:27:32
By GEORGE SEMBONY
In its quest to improve its service for the over 200,000 Tanga City residents the Tanga Urban Water and Sewerage Authority (UWSA) is putting priority in modernizing its operations through use of Information Technology.
Mohamed Abdallah, a Tanga resident has just received a phone call from his wife informing him of an impending water disconnection operation. He is in Mwanza on duty. How does he save his family from the embarrassment of water disconnection? He should not worry about that now.
In its quest to improve its service for the over 200,000 Tanga City residents the Tanga Urban Water and Sewerage Authority (UWSA) recently launched a new Water Bills Payment System effectively moving the water authority more towards computerization.
Under the system to be operated jointly with the CRDB Bank, UWSA customers who have bank accounts at the CRDB and use the Tembo Card could now opt to pay their bills through the Automatic Teller Machines (ATM).
’For those who do not have bank accounts at the CRDB, they would opt either to open accounts or pay their water bills through the normal teller windows,’ the UWSA Managing Director, Mutaekulwa Mutegeki said.
The CRDB Managing Director, Dr. Charles Kimei and his UWSA counterpart, signed an agreement on December 7, this year that establishes the system that makes UWSA the third water authority in Tanzania to use the modern system that revolutionizes water payment
The other water authorities which now use the system are the Arusha UWSA (AUWSA) and the Dar es Salaam Water Supply Company (DAWASCO).
Dodoma UWSA would be the next authority to use the system.
Mutegeki revealed that the use of the Bill Payment System is not an accident but it is part of the Authority’s Business Strategy which emphasizes the use of modern technology in its services.
”The Authority’s decision to use the system is in response to the challenge of how to serve increasing customers who flock to its offices to pay their bills every month,’ he said adding,’Of course, we are still thinking of diversifying our bill payment system to make it easy for our customers to pay their bills without any problem.’
He said that the authority is now working out a system of enabling customers to access their bills from anywhere through the internet. He said that UWSA intends to establish a web site where people could access information on the authority including water bills every month so that they could be able to pay from where ever they are.
According to the CRDB Chief Executive, Dr. Kimei the Bills Payment System was initiated by the bank in May 2, 2004 and Multichoice Company of Dar became the first company to use the service as soon as it started.
’The Bank would like to use the modern technology (ATM) to ease payment of bills for water, electricity, telephone and satellite television,’ Dr. Kimei pointed out, saying that the service saves time used by customers in rushing from bill payment office to another and that the system allows customers to pay at any time they choose.
He added that customers would now be able to pay their bills from any bank in the country regardless of where they are.
He said the system would help companies to cut costs of cash operations which are high.’Such bill payment services reduce such costs apart for reducing incidences of theft and the cost for protection of the cash,’ he noted.
Dr. Kimei added that companies may improve their services by relocating labour saved from using the system for other important company services.
He, however, reduced fears that modernization of services may result in laying off of workers, saying that, on the contrary, computerization may result in creation of employment citing CRDB which he said employs almost 100 new staff every year due to computerization of its services.
He revealed that CRDB would introduce Internet Banking between January and February, 2006, a move, which would expand banking services in the country.
The Bills Payment System is just one of the several efforts created by the Authority in its bid to serve better all the over 250,000 or so residents of the Tanga Municipality.
Mutegeki said that 98 percent of the residents of the Municipality are being served by the Authority but has set a target to serve Tanga by 100 percent.
Mutegeki also pointed out that the authority is implementing projects jointly by the Sustainable Tanga Project (STP), and the active participation of beneficiaries with the aim of increasing its coverage of the Tanga rural area.
So far, 50 percent of the rural population in the Tanga Municipality has been covered by water service aiming for more coverage through partnership with the STP,’ he said.
When the Government changed its water supply operational policy in 1994, the Tanga Municipality was not among the Municipalities that were given big chances of succeeding due to the fall of the economy following closure of many industrial establishments.
But the achievements scored by the authority have made it one of the reference points for water supply operations in Tanzania. It has trebled its revenue collection in a twelve-year period from Tshs 89 million per annum in 1993/94 to Tshs. 1.8 Billion in the year 2004/05, Mutegeki said.
Speaking at a recent interview in Tanga, Mutegeki attributed the increase to improvement of revenue collection efficiency, which has shot from 61 percent to 95.1 percent in the reported period.
”The improvement of revenue collection has enabled the authority to meet all its operational costs, despite the yearly inflationary trends,’ Mutegeki pointed out.
’Tanga Municipality is perhaps the only urban area in Tanzania that gets water continuously for 24 hours at very low prices - Tshs. 300 per 1,000 liters, or 50 buckets,’ the Authority’s Customer Relations Officer, Ms. Illuminata Gerald noted, saying that the customers’ willingness to manage the services in a cost recovery system has increased.
The customers are now more conscious of paying for the services to make it sustainable while customers have started to be conscious of the relationship between higher bills and higher usage of water.’Customers would like to use water diligently and pay less,’ she added.
Water production capacity has increased from 15,000 cubic metres per day to 42,000 while the network has increased from 189 kilometres to 300.6 kilometres moving closer to the people.
Ms. Illuminata Gerald emphasized that the improvement of water services in Tanga has succeeded mainly through involvement of other stakeholders.
However, despite the above mentioned achievements, the authority faces a number of challenges in its quest to improve its services to meet the demands of a growing population, Mutegeki said, mentioning some of them as including efforts to match an increase in operational costs with the financial ability of the customers to pay for increased bills.
Mutegeki cited other challenges as attempts to control increased pollution and destruction of water sources in the East Usambaras through gold mining and encroaching of the land surrounding the main reservoir, Mabayani Dam, on the Zigi River in the Pande area of the Tanga Municipality.
River Zigi originates from the East Usambara Mountains.
All in all the authority is setting a motion that shows how to serve the people better and reach the universal water for all targets.
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