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The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has assured the public that it will refund all excess charges to its customers who have been affected by a billing defect.

As a result of the billing defect and imbalanced calculations, customers who purchased electricity from December 14-31, 2015 suffered wrongful deduction based on the new tariff increment which was announced on December 14.

Due to a technical hitch, the deductions were back dated to December 1, 2015, instead of the December 14, 2015 when the announcement was made.

Therefore, consumers who are to benefit from the refund are those who purchased power units from December 14-31, 2015 when the new tariff was announced.

To give meaning to its assurance, the Public Relations Manager of the ECG, Mr William Boateng, in an interview, said it had put in place an electronic system to automatically refund the charges when the customers repurchased units of power.

The ultimatum

On Monday, January 25, 2016, the Public Utilities and Regulatory Commission (PURC) gave the ECG and the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) up to February 5, 2016, to refund excess bills to customers and threatened to impose sanctions on the two utility providers if they failed to heed the directive.

In a statement, the commission warned that failure by the utility providers to comply with the order by February 5, 2016 would result in a surcharge of five per cent of the excess amount overbilled to every affected customer, in addition to the refund.

The PURC announced in December a 59.2 per cent increment in electricity tariffs. 

ECG not reluctant

Mr Boateng explained that within that period of December 14-31, 2015,  customers numbering 453,449 bought units of power and were, therefore, eligible for the refund.

Out of the number, he explained that 397,269 customers had their units repaid which translated into more than GH¢5million after the system was queried on January 25, 2016.

Currently, he said, about 56,180 customers were yet to visit the vending points to enable the system to refund their charges.

“The ECG is not reluctant to refund but the system is such that we can only access their accounts when they come to buy from a vending point. The system automatically does the adjustment,” he said.

New adjustment

Meanwhile, the ECG has clarified issues relating to recently approved electricity tariffs after negotiations between the government and organised labour.

Electricity tariffs were increased by 59.2 per cent and water tariffs 67.2 per cent from December 14, 2015.

 But, the huge public outcry over the increment which was followed by a massive demonstration by Labour Union led to the announcement of a new tariff, which was expected to take effect from February 1, 2016.

The 59 per cent was, therefore, reduced to 45 per cent for consumers using 50kwh or less, also termed lifeline consumers, while consumers using 51kwh-300kwh were to pay 50 per cent.

A statement from the ECG, which sought to clarify the issues about the reduction, said consumers using 301kwh-600kwh would continue to pay the 59.2 per cent.

The statement said aside from the tariffs, there were other charges such as the 10 per cent energy sector levy on the bill.