Outrage Over APUA Billing System

Details

Business News

Saturday, 10 November 2012 02:31

By caribarena news

Antigua St. John's - Consumers may have yet another issue to gripe about as the Antigua Public Utilities Authority (APUA) moves to apply certain changes to the presentation of its products and services.

These include the manner of billing, with APUA describing the new approach as representative of “simplification” and “evolution”.

While some may agree that the processes at APUA have indeed been made more simple, others - like individuals looking for detailed readings on their telephone bills - could be of a sharply different view.

As part of its new billing system, the actual telephone numbers have been removed from the bills and replaced with an “account” number. The company has also decided that, for the sake of protecting the environment and saving paper, it will not list the outgoing calls for which consumers are billed.

According to a Customer Service Representatives (CSR) at the statutory body, these two issues have created quite a fracas over the past months, especially from businesses that have multiple telephone lines and numbers.

These days, businesses falling into this category would receive multiple bills with “grand totals” but no explanation as to how these figures were arrived at.

Adding to the hassle, requests to the utility service provider for printed copies of the actual dialed calls are not as easy or simple as one might think.

In fact, Caribarena investigated the matter on Friday and found that the customer service department and the billing department do not appear to be in sync as might be expected. Added to that, APUA has reportedly established a third department to handle the details of the billing, perhaps further complicating the system.

One customer, who seems to have been making the same inquiry as Caribarena, questioned how her company was supposed to keep track of bills when it has no idea what bill is attached to what telephone number.

The customer also disclosed that prior to Friday her organization had not been informed that APUA would no longer be providing businesses with printed copies of their telephone usage.

The CSR at APUA who spoke with Caribarena pointed out that in order for customers and companies with multiple telephone lines to understand the breakdown of their telephone bills, they must first figure out what account number corresponds with which telephone number.

In simple language it means that a business or customer with 10 telephone lines have to wade through as many billing account numbers.

APUA’s solution to that maze is for customers, particularly businesses, who need itemized copies or printouts of outgoing calls from their establishments to come in and meet personally with one of the company’s senior or middle managers in order to make such a request.

Even then, there is little guarantee of how long it will take APUA to honor such requests, given the company’s reputation or rating for efficiency.

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