Erasibo Consulting

Since late 2007 we have been engaged with the Ekurhuleni Metropolitian Municipality (EMM) in first verifying and assessing its indigent policy and indigent progamme and now we are working on developing an indigent register for the EMM.

Municipalities are obligated by policy to provide Free Basic Services to indigent citizens. An indigent register is a critical tool in allowing municipalities to do this effectively, yet todate the vast majority of municipalities have not developed workable indigent registes. The EMM is arguably the first municipality in the country to develop a standalone indigent register – as opposed to having it’s billing system substitute for an indigent register.

The indigent register we have developed is based on widely available Internet technologies. This has meant the cost of development and ownership is significantly lower. The system allows the EMM to rapidly manage its indigent application, asssessment and verification processes. Some of the key features of the system we have developed include:

1. Allows the EMM to store an electronic copy of the application form
2. Allows the EMM too store data on entire families not just account holders
3. Allows for graphical representations of the data
4. Allows the EMM to track historical interactions between citizens and the city on the issue of indigency
5. Allows for easy data integration with financial system of the EMM

The system currently stores the data for over 60,000 indigent households in the EMM.