Citizens unregistered for electricity subsidy allowed to avail subsidised tariff for April

AMMAN — Citizens who are not registered for electricity subsidy on the government e-platform will be issued a new subsidised bill for the month of April, Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Saleh Kharabsheh announced on Thursday

Kharabsheh said that citizens who did not register can go to the offices of any electricity company, register on the platform and they will be issued a new bill  based on the new tariff, adding that this is only for the month of April.

Kharabsheh’s remarks came during a media briefing held at the Energy Ministry on Thursday with the Minister of State for Media Affairs Faisal Shboul, where he noted that 90 per cent of meters were registered for the subsidised electricity tariff and were recently read, noting that the bills “will not rise in value”.

The minister indicated that the new subsidised electricity bills will be issued and distributed as of next Saturday, May 14.

“We have started reading the bills of the electricity distribution companies since the beginning of April, and reviewed them, which indicated that the previously announced percentages are identical to the results,” Kharabsheh said.

According to Kharabsheh, they have recorded around 1,113,000 meters registered for the subsidised electric tariff out of a total of 1,950,000 registered meters in Jordan. 

“We would not reach a 100 per cent registration rate as there are existing categories that are not included in the new tariff support,” the minister added.

Regarding the domestic sector, the minister noted that 308,000 electricity meters were recorded until Wednesday, of which 177,000 were registered for subsidies, and the rest were either not registered for subsidies, or they are from the targeted categories.

“More than half of the registered meters for subsidies will have a decrease in the bill of half to one and a half Jordanian dinars, while 95 per cent are not affected at all,” the minister added.

Regarding the economic sectors, Kharabsheh said that the main goal of restructuring the electricity tariff is to “direct support for citizens and those who are eligible for support”, noting that the rate of reduction of the value of the electric tariff for the economic sectors reached 9 per cent.

Kharabsheh expressed his hope that citizens would perceive a decrease in commodity prices as a result of the reduction in the value of the electric tariff for the economic sectors.

Shboul noted that there are “a large number of those who are not registered on the platform for electricity subsidy”, indicating that the proceeds from the reduction of electric tariffs will not go to the Treasury, but to support the economic sectors.

Shboul pointed out that a study was conducted on the new bills after reading the meters for the purposes of making sure that the subsidy actually reaches its beneficiaries.

Chairman of the Board of Commissioners of the Energy and Minerals Regulatory Commission (EMRC) Hussein Laboun indicated that the goal of postponing the printing and delivery of the subsidised electricity bills is to ensure the validity and conformity of electricity distribution company bills, and that the subsidisation is verified.

According to Laboun, the registration platform is still available for registration, and will continue to be open, especially for people who change their place of residency to be able to edit their information on the existing meters.

“The National Contact Centre at the Ministry of Digital Economy received 20,000 inquiries about the new tariff, and the inquiries were answered and addressed, and the intractable problems were transferred to EMRC, and their number was more than 3,300 complaints, most of them were addressed and solved. However, until Thursday, only 40 complaints remained under study,” Laboun said.