Group to question Meralco big time hike before SC

MANILA, Philippines - The National Association of Electricity Consumers for Reform (Nasecore) will question the Energy Regulatory Commission's approval of the Manila Electric Co.'S (Meralco) big time power rate hike.

Nasecore president Pete Ilagan said in an interview over radio dzMM that the ERC's approval of the power rate hike was illegal because it was done without a public hearing or public consultation.

Ilagan added that the ERC has yet to issue a documentation of how its official arrived at a decision, allowing Meralco to increase its rates.

The ERC announced on Monday that it has approved Meralco's rate increase, which will be imposed on the consumers in three phases.

The ERC said it approved a staggered billing scheme for the implementation of the P3.44 per kilowatt-hour (kwh) increase in the generation charge of Meralco to cushion its impact on households.

Meralco is the country’s biggest power distributor.

Based on the approved scheme, the P3.44 per kwh hike in the generation charge would be collected in three installments: P2 per kwh this month, P1 in February and 44 centavos per kwh in March.

But with the P3.44 representing only the generation charge, a final – and possibly higher – billing figure is set to be issued by Meralco within the week.

Generation charge is the biggest component in Meralco billing. The other components are transmission charge and taxes, among others.

“Given that there are also reported increases in the prices of other commodities, Meralco’s proposal to stagger the implementation of its generation cost is timely as it will cushion the impact on electricity consumers,” ERC chairman Zenaida Ducut said in a letter to Meralco yesterday.

“The ERC therefore grants Meralco clearance it seeks to stagger implementation of its generation cost recovery by way of an exception to Automatic Generation Rate Adjustment (AGRA) rules,” she said.