Federal Minister for Energy (Power Division) Sardar Awais Ahmad Khan Leghari has taken strict notice of electricity distribution companies (DISCOs) imposing excessive and unjustified detection bills on consumers, warning DISCOs that no incorrect or arbitrary detection bill will be charged to any consumer in the future.
Addressing an important meeting with the Boards of Directors of DISCOs, the minister issued formal directives to implement a stringent and comprehensive reform framework, said a press release.
He underlined that while curbing electricity theft remains an unquestionable national priority, arbitrarily burdening innocent citizens will not be tolerated under any circumstances. Under this framework, the discretionary authority of field staff is being strictly regulated to protect consumers while ensuring that no hurdle is created for honest officers performing their duties against power theft.
In light of the Federal Minister’s directives, the Power Division is mandating that all DISCOs issue detection bills exclusively through the centralized online portal developed by PITC. A complete ban has been enforced on the issuance of manual and discretionary detection bills by field staff or SDOs. Issuing manual bills will be officially treated as severe misconduct, liable to strict disciplinary proceedings and major penalties against the responsible officials and staff.
Under this framework, comprehensive proposed amendments to the Consumer Service Manual (CSM) will be submitted in the coming days to bind every process within clearly defined timelines.
Under the new framework, replacing defective or burnt meters immediately or within a maximum of two billing cycles has been made mandatory, while average billing during this period will be restricted strictly to a maximum of two months. In cases where a meter is established to be running slow or fast, recovery or credit adjustments will be confined strictly to the preceding two billing cycles.
Similarly, bringing the duration of detection billing under strict regulation, the chargeable period for illegal abstraction by general consumers is proposed to be fixed at three billing cycles. The maximum chargeable period of detection will be capped at six months for registered consumers and twelve months for unregistered consumers.
Under this reformed mechanism, the Boards of Directors of DISCOs and their Customer Services Committees have been directed to conduct monthly, in-depth reviews to scrutinize the accuracy, transparency, and legitimate recovery of all detection bills.
