ILOILO City – “Babantayan nating mabuti ang Panay Electric Company (PECO).”
The Senate will be watching closely how the sole power distributor in this city operates, and particularly how it addresses consumers’ complaints, according to Sen. Grace Poe.
PECO is seeking to renew it franchise that is expiring next year. Its service was one of those that Poe’s Senate committee on public services discussed here yesterday during a hearing on the effects of the tax reform law on public utilities, consumer goods and transportation.
“Kung hindi nila maaayos ang kanilang serbisyo at hindi nila mapapalitan ang kanilang lumang gamit at poste, eh baka hindi na sila ma-renew,” said Poe.
Consumers’ gripes against PECO were mostly about erroneous and inconsistent electric meter readings, brownouts and poor customer relations.
“We are taking note of what we have heard today from the consumers. We will study the matter very closely, especially if the franchise application reaches the Senate,” said Poe.
PECO assured consumers it is improving its services.
“We are doing this not because we’re seeking to renew our franchise but because we recognize nga ulubrahon siya,” said Engineer Randy Pastolero, PECO’s assistant vice president for operations.
Addressing the complaint on erroneous billing, Pastolero said they have actually come to terms with many consumers.
The recent Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC)-led customers’ conference helped the lot, said Pastolero.
“Damo na nga mga accounts may nahimo adjustments and fully settled,” he said.
The Sangguniang Panlungsod (SP) passed a resolution in November last year “vehemently opposing” the renewal of PECO’s franchise and calling on the national government to take over the power distribution utility “until a qualified distributor comes in.”
PECO has been monopolizing power distribution in this city for over 90 years. It seeks to extend it for 25 more years.
One of the reasons the SP cited in pushing for the nonrenewal of PECO’s franchise was the power distribution utility’s failure to completely refund the consumers it overbilled.
In 2004 the ERC ordered PECO to refund consumers P631 million.
“Up to this date, the refund has not been completed,” said Councilor R Leonie Gerochi.
In a congressional hearing on PECO’s application for franchise renewal in November last year, the ERC said a government takeover of the power distribution system in Iloilo City – as suggested by the city council – may not be viable.
The legal counsel of ERC, Krisha Buela, told the House Committee on Legislative Franchises the government could not immediately take over PECO’s operation and should there be a power distribution utility interested to come in, a couple of years may not be enough for it to get a hang of the operation.
According to Buela, electricity supply won’t be problem but the distribution would be a concern.
PECO is actually performing better vis-à-vis the standards set by ERC, Pastolero told the House committee, most especially in the area of power outages.
“For instance, ang number of interruptions – frequency index, ang ila nga standard ara sa 20 units. Ang performance sang PECO is lower than that – 16, way better than the standard,” said Pastolero.
In terms of system average interruption duration index, “in terms of number of hours, ang ila standard is 40 while ang aton ara lang sa 19,” he added./PN
