Saturday, July 7, 2012
THE Visayan Electric Company (Veco) conducted a seminar yesterday for members of the media on power generation in the Philippines and the unbundled electricity bill as mandated by the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira).
The seminar aims to guide the media on how to report issues on power accurately.
Among the issues taken up in “Power Simplified: Knowing the Nuances of the Power Industry” was why power rates in the Philippines are higher than in other Asian countries.
Veco chief operations officer Sebastian Lacson said the Philippines has higher electricity rates because it is an archipelago and it is hard to interconnect power connections.
He added that the government allows the true cost of power to come out, without subsidy.
There are lower rates in India and Indonesia because the government subsidizes their power costs.
For example, India and Indonesia which are abundant in coal deposits, are offering free coal to private investors who can put up power plants, provided they will lower their generation charges.
Lacson said the power supply in the Cebu grid is “super” stable at present, but he suggested that construction of new power plants be started right away in preparation for higher power demand three years from now.
Engr. Jeffrey Belotindos, who supervises the key account representative of Veco, said the power consumers must know how their electricity bills are computed.
Belotindos said they must know that in the unbundled bill, such details are available as the collection reference code, account details, customer service lines, metering information, message box, consumption history, current changes, bill stub, due date, and the notice of disconnection, if they fail to pay on time.
He said that contrary to some customers’ complaints that their power connection was cut off without notice, a bill is marked red if the consumer is delinquent, which means he has to pay within 48 hours. If no payment within 48 hours is made, a visiting slip is issued, which means his power connection will be cut off in the next 24 hours.
But Belotindos advised all power consumers to pay their bills on time to avoid paying a surcharge of two percent of the unpaid amount as of the due date of the bill for every month.
Dennis Verallo, supervisor of the Veco Utility Economic Department, said that power consumers must also read the electricity bill to find out that 68 percent of the amount are for power generators and only 22 percent for distribution utilities such as Veco. source
Published in the Sun.Star Cebu newspaper on July 07, 2012.
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