The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) on Wednesday, March 14, 2018 announced the implementation of a major tariff review of the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC), which implementation took effect same day.
We recall a couple of weeks ago when PURC announced a general reduction in electricity tariffs effective March 15, 2018.
In that tariff cuts for electricity consumers, we were told that residential customers per the new tariff cuts will enjoy a 17.5% reduction, while non-residential customers will see a tariff cut of 30%.
Those in the mining sector, we were made to understand, were also going to enjoy a 10% tariff cut, and 25% cut for Special Load Tariff Customers.
Early last week, addressing a press conference , Managing Director (MD) of ECG, Mr Samuel Boakye-Appiah, disclosed that “…customers of ECG should note that the programming of the billing system will refund the reduction from March 15-March 31 when the deposit they deposit cash or purchase electricity from April 1, 2018 onwards.”
INDEED this is a welcoming piece of news, as it will bring some relief to especially electricity consumers in the country.
Besides the refund, Todaybelieves the implementation of this new electricity tariffs will equally cushion many electricity users in this country, particularly those in the poor income bracket.
However, we hope that the ECG will not repeat the same mistakes when similar tariff cuts were announced last year and consumers were informed that they would be reimbursed.
We recall several ECG vending centres being inundated with customers.
That also led to long-winding queues formed at various vending centres.
Eventually, those who could not endure the pain and frustration of standing in these long queues amidst network challenges had to leave for their various homes.
Today hopes that this time around ECG has put in place adequate measures to facilitate the process, which is expected to kick-start April 1, 2018.
This, the paper believes, is critical, especially when similar cases in the past, following tariff cuts, did not go as expected.
While looking forward to a smooth process this time around, we want to believe that ECG catered for all power consumers who needed to be reimbursed the last time such reductions were announced.
On that score we seize this opportunity to commend the government on the implementation of such a measure that will, no doubt, cushion Ghanaian power consumers.
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