National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) has allowed power companies to hike electricity prices by 50 paisa per unit under quarterly adjustment, reported 24NewsHD TV channel on Wednesday. 

The Nepra has completed hearing on request by power companies to hike the prices for the second quarter of the current fiscal year. 

The Authority will issue a detailed decision after going through the figures and statistics.

Power companies had sought permission from the Authority to collect Rs17 billion from the consumers. 

The Power Division administration has requested for an immediately implementation on the decision with no more delay. 

The Nepra administration said a hike of Rs3.58 was already in place and with new request for hike of more than Rs3 in power prices would be unfair with electricity consumers. The Nepra chairman said two hikes in a month of more than Rs 6 would be a cruelty with power consumers which should not be done.

The Nepra Chairman said the difference of transmission charges adjustment was bigger in the current quarter. If these charges were not to be paid the amount to be received from power consumers would be lesser. He said capacity charges of Pesco were in minus. 

Pesco consumers complain that load shedding is being done whereas company says it is using electricity less than its capacity, so there is something wrong at the bottom, the chairman said.

He said IPPs were being paid capacity payments but the electricity was not being used too. He said Pesco had been asked to explain why the electricity was not being utilized up to its capacity.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa member Nepra said resorting to loadshedding was easy for the companies than to control the line losses. 

The Nepra chairman said the report which was given on power blackout, had not been implemented.