WASA to hands over water bill collection system to private sector

RAWALPINDI: The Water and Sanitation Agency (WASA) is planning to hand over the collection system to a private company to ensure 100 percent recovery of water bills from commercial consumers.

Sources said that WASA has formulated a new policy to reduce the fiscal deficit and recover water dues, under which a company called “OneLink” has been asked to increase water tariffs and collect water bills from domestic consumers.

An official from WASA said after an agreement with the company, customers will be able to submit water bills from their mobiles while the system of collecting bills through banks and post offices will be abolished.

Under the new proposed system, customers will also be able to check the category of their bills. This will eliminate the possibility of incorrect billing, the WASA official added.

Raja Shaukat, MD, WASA, said that at the commercial level, “The arrears of consumers who do not pay their dues regularly are being estimated and TORs have been fixed by including it in the agenda of the next meeting of the authority”.

He said the work of recovery of commercial dues will be done on contract. “Similarly, the proposal to increase the tariff of WASA is also under consideration as the existing tariffs have been going on for many years which makes it impossible to meet the expenses of WASA”, he added.