Increase complaints against utility companies

Oct 07, 2019 News

Dela Britton, the Public Utilities Commission’s (PUC) Chairman, in an interview with Kaieteur Radio on Tuesday, disclosed that she has seen a lot of foot traffic. She noted that they have streamlined the foot traffic differently.
“It’s not because of me; the foot traffic was there before me.”
The PUC chairman said that as of September 26, last, approximately $25.7M was redressed by Guyana Power & Light (GPL); $2.2M by Guyana Telephone & Telegraph (GTT) and $341,378 by Guyana Water Incorporated (GWI).
She also noted that there are instances where the complaints are resolved and the utility company is not blamed as a result of the consumer being at fault. She claimed that meter tampering is one such case.
In addition, she explained some complaints PUC receives as it relates to the telephone company. She made reference to GTT and pointed out that some complaints are faulty connections, loss of connection, change of tenancy, loss of data and application of landline services.
According to Britton, complaints can be made to the PUC by unsatisfied customers when it has been ‘exhausted’ at the utility end. She highlighted that the consumers who have concerns to report to PUC should have a reference number which would aid the utility company in looking at the consumer’s documents and would therefore be able to give PUC a prompt feedback regarding the nature of the issue.
As it pertains to timelines, Britton stated that when a complaint is received, it is forwarded with the required information to the utility companies which have a certain number of days to respond with respect to the fixed correspondence of the PUC.

The Public Utilities Commission’s (PUC) Chairman, Dela Britton

She said that when it comes to GPL and GTT, there might be some technical issues that would need to be determined and resolved on the utility end. She elaborated that GPL has 30 days to resolve technical matters, whereas all other matters are given 21 days.
“The timelines might be truncated depending on the urgency of the application. Depending on length of time that it might have taken to resolve, depending on how long we might have had the complaint at our end…The complaints’ timelines are not set in stone,” Britton explained.
When questioned about the reason behind decentralising, Britton disclosed that it was due to receiving a lot of complaints.
Britton also said that because of a mass volume of complaints in Linden, the PUC initiated an office centrally located in the community. It will be accessible to those consumers in Kwakwani and Rockstone. She further added that when the Commission visited Linden, it discovered a vast number of complaints although there was no notice in the press.
The Chairman stated that Linden is not the only place attracting the attention of the commission. It has plans for other geographic areas, especially the outlying areas.
It was noted by the Public Utilities’ Commission Chairman that the commission works collaboratively to satisfy the needs of both the consumer and that of the utility.
Britton encouraged that complaints can be made to the Commission by email, letterbox, telephone or consumers can go to any of the three offices.
PUC functions to regulate, investigate, set tariffs, and improve development and expansion plans for utility companies and their consumers. These companies include GT&T, Digicel, GPL and GWI.

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