How should your body corporate recover the City of Cape Town's fixed charges?
29 April 2026
Sarah’s Socials | Post 6
In February, we explored the City of Cape Town's (the City) controversial new fixed water and sanitation charges, and the legal battle the South African Property Owners’ Association (SAPOA) launched to challenge them. While the Court's judgment is still pending, in the meantime, life goes on, and bodies corporate across Cape Town are sitting with a very practical problem: these bills are arriving, and someone has to pay them. (I believe that some schemes are not getting the schedules from the City either?)
This article focuses on one of the most intensely debated questions in community schemes in Cape Town right now: should these charges be split between owners according to participation quota (PQ), or recovered using the schedule the City itself provides? We think the answer is clear and here's why.
A quick recap: what are these charges?
Since 1 July 2025, the City has been billing bodies corporate and homeowner’s associations (as the account holders on bulk water meters) for fixed water and sanitation charges. These charges are not based on how much water your unit actually uses. Instead, they are calculated according to the municipal valuation of each unit in the scheme.
The City is meant to send one consolidated bill to the body corporate along with a breakdown schedule showing exactly how much each individual unit owes, based on that unit's specific valuation. In practice, however, the schedule may not be sent to the scheme with the consolidated bill. In this case, the first step is to contact the City directly and request it.
So why the debate?
Some in the industry have argued that because these charges arrive as one lump sum to the body corporate, they should simply be treated like any other body corporate expense and split between all owners according to their PQ. PQ is the percentage share each unit holds in the scheme, used to calculate monthly contributions to the body corporate. On the surface, that logic sounds reasonable. But there's a significant problem with it.
These are not body corporate expenses. They are individual owner expenses.
Here's the key distinction: the City is using the body corporate as a collection conduit. Think of it the same way the Community Schemes Ombud Service (CSOS) levy works: the body corporate collects a fee from owners and passes it on. The City has explicitly confirmed this intent: the schedule of individual valuations and charges is provided specifically to assist schemes with recovering the costs from their own members, unit by unit.
The City's own Directorate of Water and Sanitation has put this in writing. In a communication we received during July 2025, the Directorate confirmed that the City's contracts for water and sanitation supply are with the scheme as a whole (via the bulk meter), and that the scheme will be billed for the full amount. But the Directorate also pointed to Prescribed Management Rule 29(3) of the regulations to the Sectional Title Schemes Management Act, which deals with the recovery of supply costs from individual members.
In other words: recover it from owners the same way you recover metered utility costs: per the schedule, not per PQ.
Why does it matter?
Because the difference could be significant. Based on the PQ schedule, a unit might owe more than the City’s schedule might suggest.
Using PQ will result in some owners paying too much and others too little. That's not equitable, and it's also not what the City intended.
So what should your body corporate do?
Step one: contact the City of Cape Town and request the valuation schedule if you haven't already received it. This is the document you need to recover the charges correctly: unit by unit, based on each owner's individual municipal valuation.
If, after making that request, no schedule is ever provided, then (and only then) recovering the charges on a PQ basis may be the only workable option. But PQ should be a last resort, not the default.
If your current budget didn't account for these charges (and many budgets didn't, given they were introduced mid-year), your trustees will likely need to raise a special contribution to cover the amount owed. Going forward, these charges should be factored into your scheme's annual budget and recovered from each owner according to the City's schedule.
It's also worth noting that the City has confirmed it followed the required public participation process before implementing these charges, so the obligation to pay them doesn't disappear while we wait for the court's judgment on SAPOA's challenge.
We're watching the court case closely and will update you as soon as judgment is handed down. In the meantime, if your scheme needs guidance on how to structure the recovery of these charges or how to budget for them going forward, reach out to us at info@tvdmconsultants.com or call 061 536 3138.
Want to understand the full picture? Read our first article on the City of Cape Town's fixed water and sanitation charges to find out why body corporates are being billed differently, and what the SAPOA court challenge is all about.
About the author
Sarah Sydenham is a community schemes consultants at TVDM Consultants.
Sarah is also an admitted attorney, brings a well-rounded legal background and a passion for community schemes to her role.
Learn more about Sarah Sydenham.
