A member of the Senate PROTECT Committee called for the immediate amendment of the EPIRA law to stop the exorbitant charges imposed by Meralco on its consumers who are already reeling from the rising fuel and food prices due to Middle East conflict.
Senator Imee Marcos has joined several legislators questioning Meralco’s inflated consumer charges that resulted to rising bills in the last two months.
She said the immediate amendment of the EPIRA law is aimed to permanently remove unjust pass-on charges and the “compounded calculation” of system loss.
She also called on the Energy Regulator Commission and the Department of Energy to conduct similar investigations on Meralco’s inflated charges.
“This isn’t just about following the law; it’s a matter of compassion for the people. In the middle of a crisis, it should be the big companies adjusting, not the consumers who are being bled dry by the high cost of electricity,” Marcos concluded.
Marcos said the generation charges being imposed on Meralco is already expensive compared with other energy distributors. To make matters worse, Marcos said Meralco has to impose other ancillary charges, based on its “magical computations.”
According to Marcos, this system results in “double-charging.” When petroleum prices rise or the peso weakens, the electricity bill increases; however, the System Loss charge also automatically rises even if the actual amount of electricity lost in the lines has not increased.
“It’s like you’re playing with the computation just to make the bills heavier. The cost of electricity goes up once, but you charge us two or three times across different line items,” the senator asserted.
Meralco charges questioned include the standby power, which have not been used, yet already collected from the consumers. “And what hurts is that even this standby power is still slapped with a system loss charge. This is overwhelming for families who are already struggling,” Marcos explained.
Marcos also questioned that pass on charges such as lifeline rates and senior discounts, which although useful for some sectors, should not be shouldered by the energy consumers.
“Meralco is the biggest utility (firm). Can’t Meralco just absorb that (referring to lifeline and senior discounts) instead of passing it on to other consumers? Why do the small people have to carry the burden for all these discounts?,” Marcos said.
Marcos refuted Meralco’s justification that “summer demand” caused the high bills, noting that electricity consumption actually dropped from 2.711 billion kWh in February to 2.644 billion kWh this April.
She also slammed the imposition of Value Added Tax (VAT) on every component of the bill, including system loss and transmission, which further bloats the total amount.
