Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) has said it is engaging the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) for the enactment of a new law that will offer stiffer punishment for those who engage in illegal water connections.
Ing. Francis Kwesi Awotwe, Director of Operations GWCL said currently individuals engaged in illegal connections are reported to the police, named, and shamed before they are allowed to pay the cost of detection and usage cost.
He was answering questions during a media briefing and exhibition organized by the GWCL under the theme, “Accounting to our customers,” at their head office in Accra.
The event was also used to launch a Water Safety Planning by the company.
In an address, Managing Director of GWCL, Ing. Dr. Clifford Abdalla Braimah, said consumers who engage in these illegal activities sometimes end up polluting the water flow.
“Some of these persons use sub-standard pipes and other materials that end up busting and polluting the water flow, and consumers who witness this end up concluding that Ghana water is serving ‘dirty’ water,” he lamented.
He urged consumers to always report any person who engages in illegal acts since it is the same consumers who end up paying for such services.
Dr. Abdallah Braimah said the activities of illegal mining, sand winning, and pollution of river bodies also cause high turbidity and increase treatment and production costs.
“Moving forward, GWCL will embark on continuous community engagements to sensitize its cherished customers on all issues that pertain to them.”
The managing director of GWCL said measures have also been put in place to ensure that all the operational regions, departments, and units are duly examined to guide them towards the vision of becoming a world-class water utility company.
“In this vein, we have employed the use of ‘Utilities of the Future’ (UoF) and Effective Utility Management (EUM) tools in our performance standards and target setting responsibilities such that peer reviews, benchmarking, and other performance improvement tools are adopted to bring the regional offices and customer-oriented departments to a common ground.”
Adding that, “These tools will help these regions and departments to identify gaps and areas to improve and also emulate other good performing peers, all in a bid to ensure that we bring value and satisfaction to our valued customers and relevant stakeholders.”
He also mentioned that as part of efforts to improve their customer services, GWCL has started a technological drive that introduced the electronic billing and payment systems in 2015 to reduce armchair reading, reduce billing errors and make customer payments easier and accessible.