Ghana: Utilities Revenue Mobilisation - PURC Facilitates Collection of Gh¢39.4 Million

30 May 2023
Ghanaian Times (Accra)
By Abigail Arthur

The Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) says it has facilitated the recovery of GH¢39.4 million in 2022 as revenue for two utility providers from outstanding bills owed by consumers.

They were the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and the Northern Distribution Company (NEDCo).

The commission also facilitated the recovery of GH¢3.9 million in 2022 as revenue for the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL) from outstanding bills owed by consumers.

The Director of Regional Operations and Consumer Services, PURC, AlhajiA bukari Jabaru, made this known at a capacity building workshop organised in Accra on Saturdayunder the Commission's media fellowship programme.

He said the PURC facilitated these recoveries by serving as a 'mediator' between the consumers and the utility providers.

"So they write to these consumers and copy us. We then meet them and try to ensure that the parties reach an agreement. But normally an initial amount is made by the consumers before other things follow," he added.

Concerning the revenue recovery for electricity utilities, the Director of the PURC's Regional Operations and Consumer Services said for example GH¢24.9 million was retrieved from the Bono Region and GH¢13.7 million from the Western Region.

AlhajiJabaru saidGH¢20,986.26 was retrieved from the Ashanti Region; GH¢199,860 was retrieved from the Eastern Region; GH¢120,000 from theCentral; GH¢44,471.62 from the Northern and GH¢332,267.70 from the Upper East.

For GWCL, he said GH¢3.3 million was retrieved from the Central Region; GH¢617,955.50 was retrieved from the Western while GH¢3,140.91 was retrieved from the Northern Region.

Again, Alhaji Jabaru said the electricity utilities replaced a total of 3,362 poles and 5,034 meteres. They also replaced 132 transformers.

For complaint management for 2022, he said the Commission received a total of 12,106 complaints and resolved 11,630 which represented 96.07 per cent.

AlhajiJabaru said ECG complaints amounted to 6,190, out of which 6,032 were responded to representing 97.45 per cent.

"Complaints against NEDCo were 3,732 and they responded to 3,523 representing 94.40 per cent. GWCL with 1,685 and responded to 1,634 representing 96.97 percent," he added.

AlhajiJabaru said the regulated utilities also lodged499 complaints against utility consumers and 441 were resolved representing 88.38 per cent.

Regarding the monitoring of District Offices (DO) and Customer Service Centres (CSCs) of the utilities, he said the Regional Operations Directorate (ROD) monitored 125 DOs and CSCs in 2022.

"This is made up of 57 for ECG, 21 for NEDCo and 47 for GWCL," he added.

Alhaji Jabaru underscored that the ROD also monitored 252 communities' members and interacted with the management of 305 industries as well as Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).

That, he said was to ascertain the actual quality of service delivery to those communities and industries and to find out if they were satisfied with the service provision.

Read the original article on Ghanaian Times.

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