KOZHIKODE: The electricity consumers who had complained about faulty meters are now financially burdened by the KSEB charging for additional units toward adjusting the arrears.
KSEB authorities failed to change the faulty meters in time and fianally when they were replaced all consumers have been getting bills for exorbitant amounts.
When consumers complain about this, KSEB authorities explain that the additional amount has been charged towards arrears for the power that they had consumed when the meter was faulty.
“Even when my meter was working properly, my power consumption ranged between 250 to 300 units. Then my meter became faulty and I had given a complaint to the AE, KSEB Vellayil. However, they did not replace my meter for several months and when they did later it was replaced with a digital meter. The first bill I got after meter replacement was around Rs 5,000 and when I complained about this, they installed a parallel meter for a week and said the new meter was working perfectly fine. I had to pay the amount and this month also the bill is around the same amount,” Raghuku-mar a consumer from Nadakkavu told Deccan Chronicle.
He said his actual consumption as per the me-ter reading was around 450 units but he had been charged for 700 plus units. “When I enquired about this, I was told that the additional units were added as arrears,” he said. Several consumers in Kozhikode have raised similar complaints and said what KSEB did could not be justified.
“A middle class family’s monthly budget cannot afford such exorbitant electricity charges. We are paying for the failure of KSEB to change the faulty meters in time,” Chandrasekharan, another consumer said.
When contacted, P Kumaran, Chief Engineer, Distribution, North said that KSEB could not change the meters in time due to non-availability of meters.
“When the new meters are installed, we take the average consumption of consumers prior to the meter becoming faulty and that is added to the present usage. This is done to compound the power usage by the consumer when the meter was faulty. If there are discrepancies in this, the consumer can check his average monthly consumption prior to the meter becoming faulty and lodge a complaint with the AE and it could be rectified,” P Kumaran, said.
