KARACHI, Dec 4: After the take over of the Karachi Electric Supply Corporation by the new management, citizens are expecting improvement in transmission, distribution and billing systems.
Consumers in the city are generally complaining about the arbitrary billing being imposed by the KESC officials. The people accused officials of the KESC of trying to retrieve the power charges of 40 per cent of power leakages from law abiding consumers.
They said that the leakages were due to the inefficiency and mismanagement by the KESC itself and the consumers were not at fault. Consumers are charged on the basis of an area, where he resides and not how much units had been consumed.
Alteration in meters could be done easily on the pretext of meter checking and thereafter the meter became fast, people claimed and added that the consumer could not find any authority to fight their cases.
For instance, soon after the takeover of the utility service by the new management, its officials sent a consumer an exorbitant bill amounting to Rs12,400 for the month of November this year. The consumer, resident of R-229, Project Z/A, PRCH Society, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, received a bill for October amounting to Rs618 only. The bills sent to the consumer for the months of September, August and July were of Rs1,529, Rs1,529, Rs1,815 respectively. The consumer was shocked to see the latest bill and she was astonished when she saw the meter reading appeared on the bill matched the reading on the meter.
According to her family, the house was purchased in the year 1998-99 and the bill received was of more than Rs60,000. The previous owner disputed the bill but paid ultimately when he found no way out. The bill was sent on the basis of assumption, the family claimed.
Having received the bill of November, a family member went to a local office of the KESC and disputed the bill amount saying that the meter had gone fast. The KESC officials told him that a team would check the meter and decide whether it was working properly or not.
However, a consumer did not have right to get it checked from an independent institution and all he or she had to depend on the report of KESC meter checking team while the KESC was already a party into the case.
Having failed to get the amount rectified, the consumer tried to get the payment in instalments as the amount was exorbitant and the family was unable to pay the amount altogether.
The officials refused to convert the bill into instalments and said that once a consumer was default on payment, the entire amount could not be converted into instalments.
If the consumer defaults on payment, she has to pay an arrear for late payment amounting to Rs1,405 in addition to the actual amount of bill. The logic of the KESC officials could not be challenged except in courts. A person, who did not want to go to court, had no other option but to do what the utility service had demanded, the consumer said.
This was not the only case, as hundreds of consumers have been going through this problem with no option left with them but to pay the bill. Ultimately, they have to pay an additional amount on account of late payment surcharge.
People urged the new management to look into the matter and overcome the leakages instead of sending bills on assumption or making alteration in meters on pretext of meter checking.
