LUSAKA HOTEL SUED OVER K1M BILL

GRACE CHAILE-LESOETSA writes @SunZambianLUSAKA Water Supply and Sanitation Company Limited (LWSC) has sued Lusaka Hotels Limited in the Lusaka High Court for failure to settle a sewerage services bill amounting to over K1 million.According to the statement of claim filed yesterday, Lusaka Hotels Limited has an accumulated bill of K1,004,662.70 which it has refused and/or neglected to pay.LWSC states that the defendant (Lusaka Hotels Limited) has been its customer with account number 03001502 receiving sewerage services which it is billed for.It says the hotel has its own borehole which is metered and LWSC only bills it for sewerage based on metered volumes.LWSC says it has on several occasions tried to resolve the matter amicably but the defendant has neglected to pay the bill citing lack of business or disputing the billing on the basis of inaccurate meter readings.It states that it engaged Lusaka Hotels Limited to resolve the dispute on billing and that it even changed the defendant’s meter but even after do-ing this, the defendant has neglected to pay the bill.“Further to changing the defendant’s meter the plaintiff, at the request of the defendant, issued a bill of quantities (BoQ) on or about February 12, 2020 for leak detection to see where the defendant might be losing water, but to date, the defendant has not acted upon this,” LWSC states. LWSC says it eventually disconnected Lusaka Hotel Limited from its sewer line in August this year and tried to resolve the matter amicably on how best the defendant could settle the bill, but that all its efforts have proven futile.The utility claims it has suffered loss and now wants payment of K1,004,662.70 being the outstanding bill for sewerage services provided to Lu-saka Hotels Limited and interest on the said sum, costs incidental to the proceedings and any other reliefs the court may deem fit to award in this circumstances. The Sun