Monitoring Report
ISLAMABAD
The coalition government has discreetly made a change in the way power consumers are billed by revising the slabs based on units consumed by generating bills in accordance with the price of the units in the last slab instead of the second last slab.
As a result, consumers have received unusually high electricity bills in August.
According to sources, the incumbent government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has put an end to giving consumers the benefit of not being billed in the higher slab in case they cross one unit. This change is now applicable on all power consumers except the protected category of consumers. Residential lifeline consumers will not be given any slab benefit.
It may be noted that the government has introduced only two categories of power consumers I-e protected and unprotected power consumers.
According to the tariff effective from August 1, the rate for the unprotected category of power consumers who use 1-100 units per month is Rs13.48 per unit, the rate for those using 101-200 units per month is Rs18.58 per unit and the rate for those using 201-300 units per month is Rs21.47 per unit. Similarly, the rate for 301-400 units per month is Rs24.63 per unit while the rate for using 401-500 units is Rs26.09 per unit and the rate for 501-600 units per month is Rs27.01 per unit. Likewise, the rate for 601-700 units per month is Rs27.65 per unit and the rate for using above 700 units per month is Rs31.12 per unit.
On the other hand, the protected category of lifeline power consumers who use up to 50 units in a month are being charged Rs3.95 per unit while those using 01 to 100 units per month are being charged at Rs7.74 per unit and those who use 101-200 units per month are being charged at 10.06 per unit with the start of August.
Moreover, the rate of Time of Use (ToU) metre for peak and off-peak hours is Rs33.23 per unit and Rs26.91 per unit, respectively.
It is also learnt that consumers of a single-phase connection are also being charged Rs75 per month while consumers of a three-phase connection have been charged Rs150 per month with the start of August.
