Ghanaians were suffering over SOFTtribe ineptitude – GWCL MD defends contract cancellation
The Ghana Water Company Ltd has said that enduring complaints by frustrated customers over billing anomalies left it with no choice than to terminate its contract with billing software provider, theSOFTtribe.
“We are losing so much and Ghanaians are suffering”, the Managing Director of Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), Dr. Clifford A. Braimah explained at a press conference Thursday in response to SOFTtribe’s media campaign alleging unfair treatment.
theSOFTtribe is set to leave its project to provide e-billing solutions after GWCL issued it with a six-months termination notice.
GWCL MD gave examples of increasing client reports on billing anomalies since 2018 when its project with theSOFTtribe began to nosedive.
Among several other complaints, Dr. Braimah said NDC MP for Mion in the Northern region, Abdul-Aziz Mohammed, a residential customer, has had cause to complain about an outrageous ₵10,000 bill.
In another example, a woman had a bill showing that GWCL owed her ₵3,000 he told a packed press conference.
Another Ghanaian customer whose Roman Ridge residence has a swimming pool was shocked to find that his bill for the month was zero cedis.
The GWCL MD said this client sent a message to one of the company’s chiefs describing its billing service as a joke.
Photo: Founder and Executive Chairman of theSOFTtribe, Herman Chinery-Hesse
Dr. Braimah says the company had to take decisive action over these complaints and moved to notify theSOFTtribe of project termination.
“My interest is to protect the interest of the people of Ghana,” he highlighted. Adding that SOFTtribe has enjoyed a long grace Period as contractors to the GWCL as a result of a mandate to support local companies.
At GWCL, a notice of termination is usually three months but in the case of theSOFTtribe it was pushed to six months.
The move was informed by President Nana Akufo-Addo’s charge to CEOs of state-owned corporations to do ‘whatever they can to protect the interest of local businesses.
After giving the tech company the benefit of the doubt, the GWCL says it can no longer tolerate its inefficiencies.
Payment to SOFTtribe continues even as the termination notice was issued several months ago.
“But the Ghanaian-owned tech firm is showing bad faith by blocking GWCL from accessing the database of its own clients”, he lamented.
Alarmed by the move, the Ghana Water Company Ltd notified the National Security to help secure its client data.