Held to account

First to explain, "DEWA" stands for Dubai Electricity and Water Authority, its Dubai's power board and water supply board rolled into one. So, here's the scenario:

• "S" is a long time DEWA account holder who has, up to the present time, received DEWA bills electronically to his email account.
• He moves house and wants to settle the final DEWA account for the previous house and open an account for the new house.
• Just as an aside, "S" has moved round the corner to a house that's the same size and quality as his previous home but the rent is AED70,000 p.a. cheaper, but that's another story........
• He goes into DEWA to pay the final bill and is told, firstly, to go away and write a letter formally requesting discontinuance of the power and water supply at the old address - heaven forfend that people could just walk into the DEWA office and disconnect their power on the spot. Secondly, as he is now at a new address, DEWA requires "an authorization Letter from your Company & ID Copy" before he'll be allowed to receive bills electronically. This despite DEWA having made the bills available in electronic form every month since the e-service started.

Its just a method of distributing bills for heaven's sake. What does a letter from the employer achieve? Would someone need a letter from their employer to receive the same DEWA bills by regular post? How about a letter from Empost guaranteeing they'll deliver the bills on time to the correct address?

If its a new policy, then why didn't DEWA ask for such a letter when the electronic service started x number of years ago? If the account is in the individual's name, what has the employer got to do with it? No doubt they are thinking to protect themselves from people "skipping" but the employer won't pay any outstanding bill in such cases.