A total of 7,017,809 Electricity customers are still on estimated billing despite various interventions by the government to bridge the metering gap, report has indicated.
Out of 12,378,243 registered customers as of 31st March 2023, only 5,360,434 have so far been metered.
According to the 2023 First quarter report released by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), in the quarter being reviewed a total of 171,107 user customers were metered.
Although this represented a slight increase compared to the 164,621 customers recorded in 2022 fourth quarter, the metering rate is still at 43.31%.
In a breakdown, the data showed that out of the 171,107 metered customers, only about 9,924 were metered under the National Mass Metering Program (NMMP) while 2,515 and 34 were metered under the Vendor Financed and DisCo Financed schemes respectively.
However, more customers were metered under the Meter Asset Provider (MAP) intervention, with a total of 158,633.
Meanwhile, the state of revenue collection inefficiencies has continued to be a concern, especially on the part of the electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos).
The Regulator had attributed customers’ apathy towards payment of energy billed to majorly to unsatisfactory DisCos services.
“This has led to mounting collection losses recorded by the DisCos. Collection efficiency of 70% for instance implies that for every N100
worth of energy billed to customers by DisCos, approximately N30 remained unrecovered from the billed customers,” it said.
For instance, in the report being reviewed, the total revenue collected by all DisCos in the 2023 first quarter was N247.09 billion out of N359.38 billion billed to customers.
It said although this translates to a collection efficiency of 68.75%, the DisCos’ cumulative collection efficiency reduced by 4.58 percent Poing(pp) from 73.33% in 2022/Q4 to 68.75% in 2023/Q1.
Similarly, the report showed that while the total collections increased by 1.41%, compared to N243.65 billion in 2022/Q4), the total energy billed increased by 8.15% compared to N332.28 billion in 2022/Q4.
According to NERC; “The overall decline in collection efficiency in 2023/Q1 could be attributed to the decline in metering electricity consumers. DisCos continue to implement various collection campaigns to improve remittance for post-paid customers.
“However, their low collection efficiency is a major threat to the NESI’s financial sustainability. To address this the Commission plans to enhance its monitoring of metering programs, such as the National Mass Metering Program (NMMP) funded by the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Meter Asset Provider (MAP) scheme, being implemented by DisCos.”
This underscores the need to intensify the push towards closing the metering gap, especially at a time when the DisCos were already pushing for a review of the electricity tariff.
Although tariff review is inevitable, this may further affect collections if: “the DisCos refuse to evaluate options for improving the optimisation of their energy delivery in line with the Service Based Tariff (SBT) regime,” says NERC.
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