Energy Briefs
IN order to check revenue losses, the Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company, IBEDC, has set up a prepaid meter team to ensure that customers are metered. The team will ensure that energy theft and bypass of meters are stopped to boost the company’s revenue.
The team will not only ensure that all the loopholes through which the company loses money are plugged, but also endeavour to make collections improve substantially to enable the company meet its financial responsibilities. Inaugurating the team in Ibadan, John Ayodele, chief operating officer, IBEDC, said revenue protection is needed to block leakages that could make the company go under, and that this trend has made many electricity distribution companies, Discos, unable to pay their bills to the Market Operators and the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trader, NBET.
He said lack of efficient revenue protection measures has been a major challenge as it deals with illegal consumption of power, prepaid meter bypass, under-billing, wrong tariff classification of customers and energy theft. IBEDC discovered that energy theft and meter tampering account for about 60 percent of revenue losses across its franchise, between January and October 2019, and the company has dealt with about 1,333 cases of meter bypass.
The establishment of the IBEDC prepaid meter, PPM team is another initiative taken by the company to curb revenue leakages, other measures include the use of advance metering infrastructure – this allows for two-way communication between the meter and the utility provider; whistleblowing initiative – to get and investigate reports and tip offs on corruption for prosecution.
Ayodele, while receiving a delegation of the Management of the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency, NESREA, in Ibadan, said the losses and financial challenges in the sector is worsened by multiple taxation and huge debt by government agencies and parastatals.
– Nov. 1, 2019 @ 16:05 GMT |
Tags: IBEDC sets up team to curb losses
