Higher Meralco bills seen this October

MANILA, Philippines—Customers of Manila Electric Co., the country’s biggest power distributor, should expect higher electricity bills in October, as the generation charge rose by an average of 14.19 centavos per kilowatt-hour (kWh), the company said Friday.

This means that households consuming 100 kWh a month can expect an increase of P14.19 in their electricity bills, while those that use 200 kWh a month will have to shoulder a P28.38 increase for October. Households that consume 300 kWh and 400 kWh monthly will have to pay  P42.57 and P56.76 more, respectively.

These increases, however, will be partly mitigated by the 5-centavo per kWh reduction in Meralco’s distribution, metering and supply charges.

In a statement, Meralco explained that the Energy Regulatory Commission released an order on October 6 granting the distribution utility provisional authority to implement the new rates for the first year (July 2011 to June 2012) of the third regulatory period under the performance based rate (PBR) mechanism.

ERC specifically directed Meralco to reduce its distribution, supply and metering charges to P1.6012 per kWh from the existing P1.6464 per kWh starting the October 2011 billing month.