ERC set to approve Meralco’s P19-b refund to customers—Dimalanta
By Alena Mae S. Flores – March 6, 2025, 8:50 pm
from manilastandard.net
The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) is set to release next week an order granting provisional approval to Manila Electric Co. to refund consumers up to P19 billion for its lapsed regulatory period from July 2022 to June 2025.
ERC chairperson Monalisa Dimalanta said this meant that consumers would be able to enjoy the refund in their April bills.
“We are targeting to release the order next week… We are rushing to meet the April bills,” Dimalanta said.
Dimalanta said the ERC completed the initial evaluation “for purposes of issuing provisional approval of Meralco’s application.”
Meralco asked ERC to approve its calculated refund equivalent to an average P0.1138 per kilowatt-hour within 36 months or until fully refunded. Residential customers are expected to have a bigger refund of P0.1937 per kWh.
This involved Meralco’s application for confirmation of the true-up calculation of the actual weighted average tariff vis-a-vis approved final distribution rate implemented during the lapsed period.
“The filing was in compliance with ERC’s Dec. 24 order, which declared the period July 2022 to June 2025 as lapsed period and which ordered Meralco to submit a proposal to refund the difference between Meralco’s actual weighted average tariff AWAT during the said period and the ERC-approved MAP for Meralco of around P1.35 per kWh,” Meralco head of utility economics Lawrence Fernandez said.
Meralco sought for the issuance of a provisional authority to implement the refund, pending the final approval of the application. It also asked the ERC to offset its over-refund in the implementation of the distribution rate true up for July 1, 2015 to June 30, 2022 amounting to P862 million.
The amount is lower than Meralco’s earlier estimate of P16 billion.
“We anticipate that once ERC has released the decision on our 5RP treating it as lapsed period and confirming that our rate for 5RP is pegged at P1.3522 per kWh, instead of P1.57 per kWh that Meralco has applied for, the ERC will direct Meralco to refund the average weighted actual tariff (AWAT) in excess of P1.3522 per kWh covering the entire 5RP,” Meralco senior vice president and head of regulatory management Jose Ronald Valles said earlier.
