The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Grand Bahama Power Company yesterday said it had changed its method for estimating customers’ electricity bills, adding that these only accounted for 3 per cent of total monthly billings.

Responding to Tribune Business’s questions in the wake of the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report that identified “16 deficiencies” in Grand Bahama Power Company’s metering and billing practices, the island’s monopoly power provider said the accounting firm’s review had confirmed bills were “being calculated correctly”.

GBPC added that after Canadian power giant, Emera, assumed majority ownership in early 2011, an internal review had identified many improvements to internal processes and documentation were needed - the same issues noted by the PwC report.

Still, conceding that it had adopted some of the PwC report’s recommendations, GBPC said it had changed its method for estimating customer bills to what was charged in the same month the year before, rather than using an average based on the previous three months’ usage.

“The company does acknowledge that it needs to improve customer complaint tracking and be more responsive to customer inquiries,” GBPC said.

“To this aim we have already begun implementing processes to address this. We do have a system to calculate estimates and, based on the recommendations of the audit, we have changed the method of estimations to be same month prior year, rather than last three-month average.”

And it added: “It should be noted that the audit did confirm that the number of estimates were only 3 per cent of total billings on a monthly basis. We can also report that by the third month the estimated billings are less than 100, indicating that in most circumstances the actual meter reading is obtained and billing records corrected.

“Most estimates occur as a result of our inability to gain access to a customer’s property. All customers that believe they have been estimated are encouraged to come in to see one of our customer service agents.”

Despite the ‘deficiency’ findings, GBPC said the PwC report had effectively given it a ‘clean bill of health’ on the major issues.

“Overall we are satisfied that the report validated the legitimacy of our practices and confirmed that bills were being correctly calculated,” GBPC told Tribune Business.

“In all cases, both the bill calculations and fuel surcharge calculations were found to be accurate.

“Soon after Emera gained majority ownership of GBPC, they conducted an internal review of many business processes. Those internal audits had concluded that there needed to be improvements made to GBPC’s documentation of processes and training. We had already begun plans to address some of these issues; therefore we were not surprised that the report identified them as well.”

GBPC’s own conclusions are unlikely to mirror those reached by many Grand Bahama business and residential consumers. Troy Garvey, community activist and a major GBPC critic, yesterday indicated he planned to call a Town Meeting to determine his next step.

It is also uncertain what measures the Grand Bahama Port Authority (GBPA), GBPC’s primary regulator, will take in relation to the PwC report’s findings. Ian Fair, the GBPA chairman, referred Tribune Business to its president, Ian Rolle, who was said to be out of office until Wednesday.

GBPC, for its part, said it expected to implement all the PwC report’s recommendations during 2013, adding that they had assisted its own plan to meet “accepted best practice”.

“GBPC takes very seriously the concerns of our customers and is constantly working to improve the level and quality of service offered,” it told Tribune Business.

“This audit has assisted in directing an internal Enhancement Programme that will ensure that related processes at GBPC are modified to align with accepted best practice. Some have already been made, and we expect to be completed with all recommendations during 2013.

“We believe that these plans are in line with Emera’s plan to improve the quality of service experienced by GBPCs customer and are in accordance with strategic plans to transform GBPC into a world-class utility.”