Full Meralco refund assured, says DoE
Energy chief Alfonso G. Cusi met with Manila Electric Company officials to discuss how they will resolve the surge of customers’ complaints
The Department of Energy (DoE) on Thursday said that superfluous power bill charges during the coronavirus pandemic will be fully returned or credited to customers’ accounts.
The development came after Energy chief Alfonso G. Cusi met with Manila Electric Company (Meralco) officials to discuss how they will resolve the surge of customers’ complaints lodged to the department.
The power utility giant apprised its 6.9 million subscribers that it will
refund over-payments that it had collected from customers especially during the questioned billing months of March to May this year.
According to Meralco president and CEO Ray C. Espinosa, they are on target to deliver the 4.1 million personalized letters to customers explaining their May 2020 bills based on the actual meter reading.
He added that they have deployed “virtual agents” in select Bayad Center outlets within its franchise area to handle and resolve questions through their social media accounts.
Meralco has also stopped charging the P47 “convenience fee” and assured that it would refund the amount it had been collecting during the billing periods covered by the coronavirus quarantine.
The fee is charged to customers who settle their bills through Meralco’s online payment platform despite persistent consumer complaints about the unusually high bills they had incurred under quarantine.
The utility firm similarly conveyed the mandate of the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) that customers “are entitled to installment plan for bills falling due from 1 March to 31 May.”
For end-users with consumption of 200-kilowatt hours (kWh) and below, the installment payments should be stretched for six months — starting with the first installment on 15 June and will end after six months or until 15 November.
The customers with usage of 201 kWh and higher can pay their bills on four equal monthly installments from 15 June to 15 September this year.
On Wednesday, the ERC has asked the Commission on Audit (CoA) to help verify that all power bill refunds have been fully returned or credited to its customers’ accounts.
The ERC chief noted that they are preparing to discuss ERC’s upcoming engagement with the CoA “as soon as practicable.”
It can be recalled that the ERC had previously sought the assistance of the CoA to establish whether the implementation of the approved unbundled distribution rates resulted in a fair return and the recovery of generation costs were indeed revenue-neutral to Meralco.