Robert Lalah, Staff ReporterTHE JAMAICA Public Service Company (JPS) has submitted a report to the Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR), which provides details of the method the company uses to bill customers.
This comes in the wake of an increase in customer complaints about excessive electricity bills, following Hurricane Ivan in September.
The OUR wrote to the light and power company last week, requesting that it conduct a thorough investigation and submit a report detailing the consumption patterns of all its customers, the number of complaints received as well as the method the company uses to bill its customers.
Maurice Charvis, director of research and planning at the OUR, said the report will assist the agency in determining "if (excessive bills) is a consumption problem or a billing problem".
STATEMENT
"A report on the billing situation has already been submitted to the OUR as well as to the minister of commerce, science and tech-
nology," confirmed Winsome Callum, corporate communication manager at the JPS, in a statement to The Gleaner. "JPS is continuing discussions with the OUR regarding the situation," she added.
Following the passage of Hurricane Ivan, the OUR relaxed the guaranteed and overall standards, which are used to measure JPS's performance. The standards, which apply to services such as connecting electricity supply, reconnecting service after payment of overdue amounts, reading of meters, responding to emergency or service calls and the delivery of bills, were suspended up to the end of October.
The statement from JPS added: "The suspension of the guaran-teed standards would have affected bills only with regards to the delivery of bills based on estimated consumption. The guaranteed standards, which have been in place since 2001, are service levels agreed on by the JPS and the OUR.
"However, with the recent tariff review, the OUR approved additional guaranteed service standards (and adjustments to pre-existing standards) for JPS."
