We are transparent in tariff adjustment – PURC replies World Bank

Electricity metersThe Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) has responded to claims made by the World Bank that its recent performance has not served Ghana well especially in the area of tariff adjustments.

The World Bank in a report launched Jul 2, 2013 said the PURC’s operations are not sufficiently transparent because it has adopted a closed approach to decision making.

The World Bank’s report further stated that the Commission’s suspension of automatic quarterly indexation scheme for tariff setting in 2012 hurt power utilities in the short term.

But the PURC in a three-page statement says its tariff adjustment is done in a very transparent manner, disagreeing with the World Bank claims.

“Our Tariff Setting Process is not in the dark as alleged by the World Bank,” the PURC said July 3, 2013 adding “Insufficient regulatory transparency as indicated by the World Bank is totally false”.

“The fact that whatever tariff decision was arrived at was not passed on to consumers for reasons of non compliance to quality of service benchmarks on the part of providers does not mean that this tariff mechanism was not applied fully or adhered to,” the statement said.

The World Bank called on the PURC and the Ghana government to better explain to the public how tariff increases are determined and why they are necessary.

The PURC responded saying that its tariff setting is “always consultative and transparent taking into account the interest of all stakeholders as required by law.”

The regulatory body added that guidelines it uses for setting utility tariffs have all been made public.

The Electricity Rate Setting Guidelines for example, the PURC says is a public document which has been given to all “utility service providers and published on our website”.

By Ekow Quandzie

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