Barbers requests Meralco to slash profit margins

Published May 24, 2020, 6:24 AM By Ellson Quismorio
https://news.mb.com.ph/2020/05/24/barbers-requests-meralco-to-slash-profit-margins/

Surigao del Norte 2nd district Rep. Robert Barbers says there’s a way the Manila Electric Company (Meralco) can prove that it is truly willing to help Filipinos get by these very difficult times.

“If they want to help the country and its people, they should also look into the reduction of their [profit] margins. Ika nga, ‘para sa bayan’ (Like they say, ‘take one for the country’),” Barbers said.

The Mindanao congressman floated this idea as the power distribution giant continues to get clobbered on both traditional and social media for issuing alleged exorbitant electric bills during the Enhanced Community Quarantine (ECQ) period, or from March 15 to May 15. This issue has been aptly dubbed “bill shock.”

Talks about these burdensome bills have yet to die down when Meralco found itself being bashed again, this time over its charging of a P47 convenience fee in paying electricity bills through the Meralco Online app/website.

“I just realized that all this time they’ve been charging fees that may seem minimal and ignorable to the consumers, but in totality will amount to a huge income for Meralco,” said Barbers as he explained how he came up with this suggestion.

“So if there are still useless charges that they pass on to consumers that they can easily forego, then they should tell us already and let it be part of their corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts,” he said.

To Meralco’s credit, it has already waived the much-panned convenience fee and promised a refund to every customer charged with it. It acknowledged too that the charging of such fee was insensitive given the current COVID-19 pandemic.

As for the alleged questionable electricity bills, Barbers said Meralco “should send a recomputed billing for April since they admitted anyway that it was a lapse on their part.”

Barbers was referring to the utility company’s admission–particularly to House Energy Committee chairman, Marinduque lone district Rep. Lord Allan Velasco–that it hardly carried out actual meter readings during the entire ECQ period. For April, Meralco bared that it only managed to cover one percent of its customers.

“That’s the point. We want Meralco to be transparent in their charges and to conduct actual meter readings so that we can be assured that there is accurate basis for the electricity bill that must be paid by their customers,” Velasco told the Meralco representatives during the Joint Congressional Energy Commission’s (JCEC) hearing last Friday.

In the hearing, the Marinduque solon showed a sample Meralco billing statement which surged to over P30,000 after averaging just P10,000 for two months prior to the pandemic-triggered ECQ.

“Mahirap na nga ang buhay, nagka-COVID pa, tapos may malaki pa silang babayarang kuryente (Life is hard as it is, then we get the COVID crisis, then we get these huge electric bills on top of that), said Velasco, who co-chairs the power sector watchdog with Senator Sherwin Gatchalian.

He called Meralco’s attention for failing to inform the public early of the changes in its billing. He requested that consumers who they fail to pay the electricity bills they incurred during the ECQ won’t be faced with disconnection.

“We will be very considerate for the benefit of our customers,” the utility company said in response.

According to Velasco, Meralco should also assure consumers that the necessary adjustment in their bill will be applied, if any, and that they will only pay for electricity that they actually consumed. “This is the only way Meralco can provide a credible basis for the charges,” he noted.