Group asks SC to cite Meralco in contempt on power-rate hike bid

Business Mirror  
17 Mar 2014 
Written by Joel R. San Juan 

Rep. Neri Colmenares of Bayan Muna on Monday asked the Supreme Court (SC) to order the Manila Electric Co. to show cause why it should not be cited in contempt for allegedly violating the temporary restraining order (TRO) it issued enjoining the power firm from implementing its P4.15 per kilowatt-hour power-rate hike. 
In a four-page omnibus motion, Bayan Muna, through its counsel Ma. Cristina Yambot, also asked the Court to compel Meralco to submit a compliance report on its implementation of the TRO. 
The group filed the motion after former Rep. Teodoro Casiño of Bayan Muna exposed to the public the Meralco billing dated Febrary 13, 2014, which included in its “total amount due” the P4.15 rate hike restrained by this Honorable Court. 
“The total amount due was in bold font and can, and did, mislead consumers into believing that the total amount due, as is usually the case, is the amount they should pay Meralco,” the petitioner said. 
Colmenares said the Court should require Meralco the immediate submission of a compliance report from showing the total number of consumers who paid before the TRO was issued, how many paid as a result of the confusing billing format questioned, how much is the interest gathered from the payments of consumers before the TRO and how Meralco has complied with the TRO issued by this Honorable Court. 
It can be recalled that the SC issued a resolution on February 18, extending the order it issued on December 23, 2013, enjoining Meralco and the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) from enforcing the approved P4.15 power hike. 
Aside from extending the TRO on the implementation of the power rate hike, the Court also issued a TRO enjoining the generation companies (gencos) and power suppliers from demanding and collecting generation charges from Meralco which the latter failed to pay after the Court stopped its P4.15 power hike. 
The petitioner noted that the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) even called the attention of the power firm on the inclusion in the latter’s “latest” billing statements to its customers of the generation charges that are subject of the TRO. Baya Muna said the DTI was referring to the items “current amount due” and “total amount due” that both appear in Meralco’s latest billing statements. 
The “total amount due” includes the enjoined generation charges while the “current amount due” does not.
“This ‘total amount due’ item in the billing statements has of course a reasonable tendency to beguile Meralco’s customers into paying the embargoed generation charges,” the group pointed out. 
The ERC, according to the group, has also announced that it is investigating the change in format in the billing of Meralco. 
Likewise, the petitioner said Meralco admitted the new billing format in their public pronouncements stating that they issued the bill being questioned to 434,000 consumers out of its 5.5 million customers. 
Out of the 434,000 consumers, a total of 37,000 paid the restrained amount. 
“Petitioners are not aware how many of Meralco’s 5.5 million customers paid their December 2013 bill before the TRO was issued by this Honorable Court. It seems that majority of Meralco’s customers have paid the restrained amount and is the reason why Meralco only sent the bill with questioned format to only 434,000 customers who have not paid,” the group noted. 
“Petitioners and others who already paid the December 2013 bill before the TRO was issued received a differently formatted bill which does not contain the restrained amount," it added. Bayan Muna insisted that Meralco’s billing format violated the TRO imposed by this Honorable Court. 
Meralco’s prepaid power scheme face headwinds The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) has slammed the prepaid retail electricity service (Pres) of Meralco which the group said violates the magna carta for consumers. 
TUCP said that Meralco should be punished for launching Pres which, in a way, was designed to abuse and skirt the law. 
The prepaid electricity scheme was launched last week after several years of pilot-testing in Angono and Taytay towns in Rizal province. 
“Access to electricity, just like water, is a basic human right. These are our political rights as a Filipino that cannot be waive by saying this is voluntary on the part of consumers. Meralco cannot do this,” Gerard Seno, executive vice president of the Associated Labor Unions-TUCP said. 
The magna carta for consumers protects residential electricity consumers by disallowing electricity supply disconnection beyond 3 p.m. at any day during the week, any time during weekends, official holidays, when a permanent occupant in the house is sick and dependent on a life-support system, when the owner is not in the house and when there is a funeral wake in the house. 
With the prepaid scheme, electricity automatically shuts off when customers ran out of load, TUCP Executive Director Louie Corral said. 
Corral added that the prepaid scheme was implemented without public consultation and do away workers for it no longer require bill collectors, meter readers, linesmen and branch office staffs. 
"There are also no guarantees that the customers of the kuryente prepaid load-scheme system are protected from the same dagdag-bawas problems many experience with prepaid mobile-phone service providers. The real issue here is that the price of electricity is high and Meralco is shifting the issue,” he said. (With Jonathan L. Mayuga) source