The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has disclosed that Electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) in Nigeria collectively remitted a total sum of ₦185.36 billion in the second quarter of 2023.
NERC in its Second Quarter, 2023 Report released on Tuesday said, in 2023/Q2, the cumulative upstream invoice payable by DisCos was ₦194.69 billion, consisting of ₦154.04 billion for generation costs from NBET and ₦40.65 billion for transmission and administrative services by the Market Operator (MO).
The Commission said, out of this amount, the DisCos collectively remitted a total sum of ₦185.36 billion (₦152.48 billion for NBET and ₦32.88 billion for MO) with an outstanding balance of ₦9.32 billion.
“This translates to a remittance performance of 95.21% in 2023/Q2 compared to the 67.43% recorded in 2023/Q1”, it said.
The NERC report also said, in 2023/Q2, out of the four (4) international customers serviced by the MO, only Transcorp-SBEE made a payment of $1.43 million against an invoice of $2.13 million issued for services rendered in 2023/Q2.
The three (3) other international customers, according to the report, did not make any payment against the $11.97 million invoice issued to them by the MO for services rendered in 2023/Q22.
“Cumulatively, bilateral customers made a total payment of ₦816.66 million against the cumulative invoice of ₦2,845.08 million issued to them by the MO for services rendered in 2023/Q2”, NERC said.
On metering, the report said, a total of 178,864 meters were installed in 2023/Q2, representing an increase of 3,583 installations (+2.04%) compared to the 175,281 meters installed in 2023/Q1.
“The new installations resulted in a 0.85pp increase in net end-user metering rate in the NESI between 2023/Q1 (43.31%) and 2023/Q2 (44.16%).
“During the quarter,168,397 meters were installed under the MAP framework while 9,302 meters were installed under the NMMP framework.
“The Vendor and DisCo Financed framework recorded 1,143 and 22 meter
installations respectively”, it said.
The Commission expects the DisCos to utilise any of the five (5) meter financing frameworks that have been provided in the 2021 Meter Asset Provider and National Mass Metering Regulations (NERC – R – 113 –2021) to close their respective metering gaps.
The report said, “as a safeguard for customers against exploitation due to the lack of meters, the Commission has continued to issue monthly energy caps for all feeders in each DisCo.
“This sets the maximum amount of energy that may be billed to an unmetered customer for the respective month based on gross energy received by the DisCo and consumption by metered customers”, it said.
On Customer complaints, the NERC report said, the DisCos cumulatively received 325,898 complaints from consumers in 2023/Q2.
This, it said, represents an increase of
76,215 (+30.52%) compared to the 249,683 complaints received in 2023/Q1.
“In total, the DisCos resolved 313,442 complaints corresponding to a 96.18% resolution rate (91.76% recorded in 2023/Q1).
“Metering, billing, and service interruption were the prevalent issues of customer complaints, accounting for more than 75% of the total complaints during the quarter”, the report said.
