Customers of the Jos Electricity Distribution Company, JEDC have seized the opportunity presented by the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, FCCPC to vent their frustrations in their dealing with the company.
The customers, in the event scheduled to take place for four days, pointed out challenges in billing, metering, transformer, connection, disconnection, customer service and other issues in the JEDC coverage areas and called for speedy resolution.
FCCPC comes to the rescue of electricity consumers experiencing transformer faults, non-reimbursement of investments in the electricity network, overbilling, metering and other issues at the Jos Electricity Complaint Resolution Platform. One more day left to complain and receive an instant response.
The Chief Executive Officer of FCCPC, Babatunde Irukera who addressed the customers said he and his team were out to have first-hand information about the problems they are facing with the view of having them resolved, urged the customers to exercise decorum and asked JEDC to measure their feedback by the number of satisfied customers that they have.
Represented by the Executive Commissioner (Operations), Adamu Abdullahi, he explained that relevant agencies in the power sector are on the ground to interact with customers to resolve the complaints received and any unresolved complaints would be given timelines for resolution as he said: “This is a continuum of the outing we have been having nationwide with the support of our sponsors to know first hand the problems you have as customers.
“Let’s speak out so that we have the issues resolved, I appeal for calm. Some of the issues are dicey, you feel aggrieved and want to express the anger but please let there be decorum as we seek solutions. As you bring your problems, be sure that we will look into them, we will give the complainants the number of days or weeks they should expect their complaints to be resolved.’’
Also, the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC through its Assistant General Manager, Customer Affairs Division, Kaneng Gwom, noted that electricity has always posed a problem and we don’t have enough supply that would make some of the situations to improve and urged customers to be familiar with NERC’s regulations to be aware of their rights.
She added, “A customer has the right to seek redress, we are here to listen to you, you are very important in the value chain. Customers are key to every segment, we count you as partners, and your problems with JEDC will be addressed.”
The representative of the Nigerian Electricity Management Services Agency, NEMSA, Engr. Koproda Cyriacus educated the customers on the roles of his organization, advised electricity consumers to insist that only meters tested and certified by NEMSA be mounted for them and urged JEDC to employ the services of only competent electrical engineers.
However, the Head of Customer Care Service of JEDC, Lucky Akpobi commended the customers for attending the forum and assured them that his organization is a customer-friendly one, attends to customers’ complaints on time and encourages customers to escalate their issues to other relevant stakeholders to ensure a timely resolution.
He further assured that issues of power outages resulting from transformer vandalism would soon be addressed as he tasked customers to safeguard electrical installations and monitor every transformer point in their communities.