UEDCL can satisfy customers and earn more money

Dec 28, 2003

SIR — First of all I wish to congratulate the UEDCL management for the steps taken to improve UEDCL

SIR — First of all I wish to congratulate the UEDCL management for the steps taken to improve UEDCL.

Operation Sigma and the Urban Power Rehabilitation project are steps in the right direction. However, before UEDCL thinks of increasing tarrifs they should address the following concerns.

The continued use of an inefficient billing system: I recently paid sh60,000 on my account but it took two months before the payment could be reflected on my account. In the meantime, I received a disconnection notice yet my account was in credit.

UEDCL should link up all the district offices to a central customer database (I hope one exists) such that payments can immediately be reflected on customer accounts. This has been done by companies like MTN. When a customer visits their service centres, any transactions like loading airtime are immediately reflected on the the customer’s account. There is no magic in wide area networks.

Secondly, the fault-reporting function should be out-sourced to a company which can set up a call centre with at least 20 professional agents) dedicated to receiving customer calls and forwarding their complaints to the technical staff.

Fault reporting will be improved and UEDCL can restore power faster. my experience of using the 185 number to report faults is not a very good one. Many times the operators never answer the phone (leading to longer black outs) and even when they do, they have the wrong attitude and several times hang up before you have even finished explaining your problem.

I do not know the calibre of people who man these lines but they seem to be technicians who should be out in the field solving problems rather than receiving customer complaints. sending these technicians to the field would boost the number of technical staff handling faults. Recently, it took me two hours of constant ringing before someone picked up the phone.

UEDCL should develop a customer location system which correlates the customer account number to save time and money.

The other concern is poor and dangerous workmanship. Why use wires instead of fuses in transformer sites? Some distribution transformers have several strands of aluminium wires used as fuses, this may resolve the problem of a blown fuse but is very risky. If the right fuses are used throughout the network, distribution transformers will be well protected from overload and short circuits which will increase their life span and reduce operating costs.

Poor installation practices using poor quality cables are evident especially for the supply cables from the supply pole to domestic premises. many times several sections of wire are joined in a very un professional manner and the joints are often left uninsulated.

There are customers who lose supply because the joints have corroded and cannot conduct current any more. In relation to this, UEDCL staff do not seem to have all the protective gear required to carry out their duties which puts their staff at risk and lead to poor workmanship. The Kajjansi incident where UEDCL staff died a few months ago could have been avoided.

Lastly, the planning function in UEDCL needs to be strengthened so that UEDCL can forecast the load /demand and plan for it. UEDCL should make use of figures like KVA/square km, that they have gathered over the years to plan so as to ensure continuity of power supply in face of increasing demand.

The issues raised above coupled with the depreciation of the dollar, falling oil prices and the availability of transformers from Tanzania, UEDCL should be able manage its affairs better and make a profit without having to raise tarrifs.

Sam Beswell
Kampala

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