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Power consumers will be compensated for failure in service delivery- NERC
By Modupe Shodeinde
The Vice Chairman of the National Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has declared that the failure of power distributors to supply the required quantum of electricity under the new service reflective tariff will be compensated.
He noted that all DisCos had committed to delivering an agreed quantum of power to consumers in various categories from the 1st of September, 2020 when the new service reflective tariff regime began.
The Vice Chairman of the commission, Sanusi Garba, said the commission had devised a mechanism for monitoring the DisCos. This would be on a monthly basis to ensure compliance to the agreement.
Garbage said the service reflective tariff would ensure that consumers of distribution paid for what they consumed.
He said, “The commission has come forward to say tariffs will be service based, meaning that you will pay your rates in correlation with the level of service you get.
“Now, obviously the commission has its own mechanism for monitoring the performance of the Discos. This is because if a Disco says you are in Band C, it means the Disco is committed to giving you between 12 to 16 hours as minimum.”
He added that, “the role of the commission is to monitor and at the end of the month to determine which Disco has complied with their service commitment or not.
“And consumers will be compensated for failure to deliver on that service. We do not expect consumers to start putting gadgets to monitor electric
He explained that consumers are not expected to monitor the compliance of disco, rather, they are expected to complain to the commission if they believe there has been a service failure, which would be resolved by NERC
The Vice Chairman said government was working towards providing funds for meters when told most consumers do not have the meter to determine the right tariff payment.
He said, “On the issue of metering and the concern that consumers don’t have meters, I’m sure you are aware that the commission issued an order capping the amount of energy that an unmetered customer should be billed.
“That was designed to make all Discos to expedite the process of providing meters to all consumers because that is the way the electricity business is designed to run.”
He added, “Now in also approving this rates review, the President directed that financing should be put on the table so that all consumers are metered much faster than the rate that Discos can raise financing.”
Garba said that the commission is taking several step to eliminate the problem of estimated billing.
