A customer has threatened to sue Kenya Power over an absurd electricity bill that had her disconnected.
A demand letter from Orondo-Tuli & Co Advocates dated December 16, 2019, and seen by The Standard, has demanded that KP restores power to the client’s premise in Rongo Town.
Failure to do this, the letter reads, the power company risks being sued. The genesis of the letter is a Sh199,714 power bill, which Evaline Anyango Oluoch received. She then wrote to KP on November 18, to protest.
KP, in a letter dated November 25, 2019, replied, admitting an error on their side on the billing, which led to a deduction of Sh52,578 from her bill.
“By crediting our client’s account to the tune of Sh52,000, you have already admitted, that our client was justified in disputing the billing presented to her. Indeed, it is inconceivable how such a huge billing could be arrived at for a domestic account,” reads the demand letter addressed to KP.
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KP, in its response, stated that it believed the meter was accurate, but added that a check meter was installed on November 20, just to determine the authenticity of the bill. The company said the result of the check should be expected in 30 days.
The power company admitted that as at July 29, 2018 the meter captured a reading of 25022.
“Billing of the account was, however, irregular up to June 2018, leading to cumulative figure in July 2018 with 5,392Kwhrs out of the 7344Kwhrs recorded over the July 2016-July 2018 period being billed for the billing period June 26, 2018 to July 29, 2018, hence the bill of Sh159,522,” reads KP’s explanation in a letter signed by KP Manager Commercial Services, PK Wambua.
But before the billing could be cleared, Ms Anyango, through her lawyer, indicates that power was disconnected from her residential premise on December 17.
This is after receiving a bill of Sh199,714 on December 12.
“Please note that your action, as captured above, amounts to a violation of our client’s consumer rights as provided in the Constitution of Kenya 2010,” reads the demand letter addressed to KP.
“We have been instructed to demand, which we hereby do, the immediate restoration of power and provision of an accurate and correct billing for the disputed period to our client’s without failure,” it adds.
