The Director of Public Relations and External Affairs at the Commission, Nana Yaa Jantuah said: “Over billing has always been with us,” adding that the PURC investigates the issue when the complaints increase.

“Every time in handling complaints, we have people who say they have been overbilled...If we start seeing more increases then it means that we need to investigate it but now we are doing a very holistic work,” she explained during an interview on Accra-based Joy FM.

The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) had admitted to overbilling some consumers due to a software problem.

The PURC subsequently ordered the power distributor to halt the usage of the said software until further notice.

“We have a lot of people coming there. Every day you find the place is filled with people coming to complain. If anyone is dissatisfied and they gone to the utility service providers and they don’t get answers, they should come to us. We have offices all over the country.

According to her, the PURC has procured some mobile phones and the numbers will be put out the numbers soon to enable consumers to call with their complaints.

“It’s easier for people to call cell phone numbers but we are located very close to the WAEC office. If you stand in front of WAEC, you will see our complaints office,” she said.

She also indicated that the Commission will consider doing advertisements and announcements “for people to know where we are” but in the meantime, she asked the general public to call the PURC’s hotline - 0302 244188 to make their complaints known

Electricity conservation

Nana Yaa Jantuah stressed the need for Ghanaians to conserve energy saying, “if you are not using the electricity, please put it off because if you do not conserve, you will pay more and we might also go back into the situation that we don’t want to go to.”

She acknowledged that in terms of educating the public on conservation both the PURC and the the Energy Commission have failed but promised that steps will be taken soon on the education front.

She called for a policy direction towards energy conservation.

She also urged the media to help the PURC and the Energy Commission saying, “if every morning you can devote 5 minutes for conservation tips, it will be useful.”