Water Boards in South Africa are, by law, required to consult with the regulator, the Department of Water Affairs, and their customers prior to implementing tariff increases. To facilitate this, they make specific submissions/motivations to the key parties. The primary customers of water boards are municipalities and SALGA is the umbrella body that represents local government. The evaluation of tariff increases is a complex process and SALGA therefore employed specialist consultants Pegasys, supported by WAI, to carry out the analysis and provide critical feedback.

WAI were allocated a number of water boards to assess. The work included analysis of the submission documents, annual reports, infrastructure master plans and business plans. This broad scope was necessary in order to be able to fairly assess the validity of the proposed increases. The work included assessment of the balance sheets, income statements and relevant ratio analysis. The validity of infrastructure expenditure proposals and operation and maintenance expenditure was also assessed. The analysis included both historical trends and future projections. The work culminated in reports summarizing the findings for all of these issues, together with specific recommendations.

Client: South African Local Government Association (SALGA)
Duration: January to March 2013
Value: ZAR84 000
Country: South Africa