Meralco apologizes; DOE to pursue probe

MANILA, Philippines — The Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) has apologized for charging consumers additional fee for the use of mobile application to settle their bills.

However, the Department of Energy (DOE) said it would continue to investigate the P47 convenience fee Meralco imposed on its clients.

In a letter to Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi, Meralco president and CEO Ray Espinosa apologized for charging customers the convenience fee for using the Meralco App during the enhanced community quarantine in Luzon.

“Perhaps what Meralco should have done during the enhanced community quarantine period – March 16 to May 15 – was to shoulder the convenience fee charged by the payment gateway provider, considering that the Meralco business offices and Bayad Center branches and partner outlets were closed during that time,” he said.

To address the issue, Meralco said it would waive and refund the said amount to consumers who used the mobile application.

“Meralco will shoulder the convenience fee charged during the aforesaid (quarantine) period and refund to customers the fees they paid,” Espinosa said.

However, the DOE will still continue to probe the convenience fee in the Meralco app, Cusi said in a text message yesterday.

“The convenience fee is not a closed issue. The DOE will still look deeper into it,” he said.

Meralco said the refund would only cover those who used the Meralco App to settle their electricity bills during the enhanced community quarantine from March 16 to May 15.

“After May 15, all business centers are already open and other payment options as well,” Meralco spokesman Joe Zaldarriaga said in a text message.

Asked how the refund would be done, he said the power distributor is still working on a process.

“We will ensure that we reflect it in a process that will be easy to understand,” Zaldarriaga said.

Since March 16, around 300,000 transactions were made using the Meralco App, Meralco head of utility economics Lawrence Fernandez said.

Last week, Cusi wrote Meralco, directing it to explain the convenience fee of P47 when paying for electricity bills using its mobile app after the DOE-Consumer Welfare and Promotion Office received numerous reports on the additional fee during the quarantine period.

Amid the enhanced community quarantine imposed in Luzon, Meralco has been encouraging customers to use online channels to settle their accounts.

It said multiple options for transactions have been offered by the distribution utility, including the Meralco Mobile App, Meralco Online and the Meralco authorized payment channels.

Espinosa, however, clarified that the Meralco App was launched back in September 2018 to provide customers an additional 24/7 online payment channel, which customers may use at their convenience to pay their bills.

Convenience fee

Moreover, the convenience fee does not go to Meralco but to its partner payment provider, Espinosa said.

“Meralco bills paid via the Meralco App Online Payment Facility go through a payment gateway operated and maintained by PayMaya (which is linked to the Visa and Mastercard networks). PayMaya charges the Meralco customer a ‘convenience fee’ of P47 per transaction. No part of the convenience fee goes to Meralco, he said.

“The charging of a convenience fee by a payment gateway provider like PayMaya is a common commercial practice in the online payment service industry,” he added.

Earlier, the DOE chief said Meralco is required to get government clearance on this kind of innovation.

“Meralco is supposed to obtain authority from the government to do something like this. Apparently, your offices are justifying that you do not need to go through the government because this fee collection does not go to Meralco – that it goes to your app service provider,” he said.

Consumer groups welcomed Meralco’s decision but said the power distributor should just remove the convenience fee in its mobile app.

“Laban Konsyumer Inc.  believes that Meralco should drop the convenience fee for good. P47 is approximately P6 to 7 kilowatt-hours addition on to the bill,” LKI president Victorio Dimagiba said.

“We thank Meralco for that decision. That’s a clear admission of Meralco’s abuse of market power – lack of authority,” National Association of Electricity Consumers for Reforms national president Pete Ilagan said.

The consumer group also urged the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to investigate the convenience fee.

“There must be an ERC audit of the collections from this P47 convenience fee and an ERC approved refund mechanism. ERC must also determine Meralco’s liability,” Ilagan said.