The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, (NERC), has said that it is committed to protecting Nigerians from outrageous estimated billing.
The Commission said this in an awareness video released via its social media platform recently.
The awareness video addressed the use of energy caps which were created to protect unmetered customers from outrageous estimated billing. NERC said it has developed a methodology to determine monthly energy caps, which is the maximum amount of energy distribution companies (DisCos) can charge unmetered non-maximum demand (non-MD), customers, each month.
According to NERC, the caps are determined based on the consumption of neighbouring customers and DisCos are penalised for flouting them. The introduction of energy caps by the NERC aims to provide a fairer billing system for customers who have not yet been metered.
By establishing maximum limits for billing, NERC seeks to prevent DisCos from overcharging customers based on estimations, which have often led to disputes and complaints.
Under the NERC electricity service charter that was released in April 2023, the Commission stated that unmetered customers have the right to transparent billing and should also be refunded if they have been overbilled.
