Stories have hit the Johannesburg press about problems with the city’s new water and electricity billing software.  It’s the thing that all billing managers fear – stories of incorrect bills and angry consumers getting into the newspaper.  Neither of the stories have reported the name of the software being used, but the chairman of the Finance Committee [1] is reported as saying “German specialists were periodically brought in because the billing system had been designed by a German company.”  That’s all pretty clear then.  However the problems as reported seem to lie not so much with the software but with the implementation.  Mayor Amos Masondo admitted that Project Phakama - to set up the new billing system - had not been implemented fully, with two of five modules not put into effect.  There also seems to have been an issue with customers old accounts not having been migrated to the new system.  The two stories – and you can bet there will be others – about the electricity water billing system can be followed up [2] here and [3] here.