Gov’t offers power rate discounts to 4.2 M customers

BY MYRNA M. VELASCO – Jul 21, 2023 04:45 PM
from Manila Bulletin

Discounted electricity rates are being offered to the country’s 4.2 million marginalized or lifeline consumers within the power usage bracket zero to 100 kilowatt-hours (kWhs).

Energy Undersecretary Rowena Cristina L. Guevara announced that the registration for the discounted rates to the qualified lifeline consumers already started; and the first batch of registrants will experience reduction in rates in the August billing cycle.

She emphasized that the government has been intensifying its call for “lifeline consumers” to register for this rate subsidy program because this will redound to lower electric bills that they will be paying monthly.

Qualified customers are mainly the household-beneficiaries that are also enrolled in the state-sponsored 4Ps program, the main anchor of the poverty reduction strategy of the government.

The new list for the power sector “lifeliners” had been jointly cleaned up by the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) and the distribution utilities.

The DOE, in particular, is taking the lead in the enforcement of this policy, which could help ease  the pockets of lifeline consumers, especially for families that have been struggling to make ends meet on their monthly budgets.

As prescribed under the Extended Lifeline Subsidy Law (Republic Act 11552), residential end-users with zero to 20 kilowatt hours (kWhs) of consumption are granted 100-percent discount, that means, they will not be paying anything in their electric bills.

Those with 21 to 50 kWhs of usage can avail of 50 percent discount and those in the 51 to 70 consumption bracket will get rate reduction of 35percent, while those with 71 to 100 kWh usage will get 20 percent discount.

Guevara noted the registration for lifeline subsidy remains very low, thus, the DOE has been stepping up its information drive for qualified residential customers to take advantage of the rate discounts. The subsidy is part of the solution to the never-ending grumbles of ratepayers on expensive power rates in the country.

She emphasized “the scale of rate reduction will vary depending on the prevailing rates of the DUs…there is no deadline on when the consumers could avail of the discounted rates. But in the August bill, if they are not registered, then they cannot avail of the benefits.”

The energy official said the registration process is relatively a seamless process, because the beneficiaries will just need to secure certification from the DSWD for submission to their servicing DUs for the rate discount availment.

ERC Chairperson Monalisa C. Dimalanta added that based on feedback they have been getting from power utilities, the consumers “are not registering because they have not felt the pain, so maybe, there’s no impetus yet.”

On the part of the regulatory body, she indicated that a paradigm similar to the food stamp program’ of the DSWD may eventually be conceptualized for the ‘lifeline discount rates but added that “for now, we have to go with the registration process first.”