[Resolved]  Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Co. Ltd — ERRORS IN BILL

Address: Maharashtra

Hi,


I wanted to share an outrageous experience that I have been going through while dealing with the MSEB here in this area.

The MSEB meter at my place was dysfunctional for last 8 months. In spite of frequent complaints and application to change the meter, no action was taken and I was charged preposterously high amounts every month.
I finally threatened the MSEB that I will stop paying the bills unless they change the meter (which did not even have a display, and the amount on the bills was utterly random ranging from 0 Rs to 10000 Rs every month).
This went on till last month and they finally disconnected the electricity. I went to the MSEB office and showed them the bills and application copies that I had submitted regarding the errors in the billing.

As done several times before, I again explained them that I can’t pay the bills as they are enormously high and unfair as my meter is dysfunctional since last 8 months and those numbers were random. However, a typical case of redtapism, there was nobody to hear me out and their officer in charge was as usual not in his cabin. I was told that unless I pay the amount, they will not even consider my complaint. I finally managed to convince them to reduce the amount so that I can pay the bill. They reduced it to a partial sum of 4500Rs which I paid immediately. Then they agreed to change the meter and told me that the sum that I have paid will be adjusted once the correct bill comes from the new meter. They did change the meter in couple of days. This happened in last month.

Now one month later, the new meter gave a bill of 400+ Rs. Considering the average of 400 rs per month, the total bill for these 8 months comes to 3200 Rs. I had already paid 4500 Rs. The MSEB owes me more than a thousand bucks. But look at the way they work, they come in the morning today and disconnect my connection without any notice or informing me. I take a half day leave, like I took last time, I search for the latest bill, it shows me that the due date is August 10th 2010 (today is 5th august 2010) and there is a mention of a note that I owe MSEB 7800 Rs. I am about cross the boundary of sanity but I control myself and commit another crime of visiting the MSEB office.

This time I am utterly lucky as I find their officer in charge right out of the office. I try to tell him my situation, he completely ignores me and sends me to one of the clerks and disappears somewhere in a car. I explain the whole situation to the clerk. The clerk says that you need to pay the 7800 Rs. I explain him that its not me who owes money to MSEB, it’s the other way round. Then one of them understands it and sends someone to re-connect the connection. I ask them a solution for this recurrent issue. The clerk suggests me to visit his officer in charge. Its 4.00 PM and their officer in charge had already left the office. So he asks me to visit 11 AM tomorrow (I have to take another leave tomorrow). I ask him if this will be sorted out? He replies no, you will have to go to the RAHATANI office once you are done with solving this issue at our end. Apparently the billing section is in RAHATANI and I will have to personally go and request their officer in charge (I don’t think he will be available once I go to their office) to update the same. I ask why cant you do it? He replies, the billing section wont listen to us and this problem will arise next month as well, so its better you go and fix it yourself. I try to point out that its MSEB’s fault and not mine. He agrees to that, but says that’s the way things work here.
I then call up the officer in charge on his cell phone, who talks to me rudely and asks me how dare I call him on his number??? And hangs up.

Now, I try searching for the numbers of some superior authority to lodge a complaint , I search all over the net and find some important numbers. I call all of them, but nobody attends them.

So here I am, who has given extra money to MSEB and whose electricity line might get disconnected any time without any notice and who will have to take leaves and spend time requesting the MSEB to clean their own mess.

In the mean time, I came to know that there are several people in this area who are facing the same problem. There are people who in spite of paying bills face disconnection and have to take Xerox of their paid bills and write applications and submit to RAHATANI office (which is quite far from Old Sangvi) to get the reconnection. The staff in the MSEB is utterly rude and they don’t give a damn about customers. The officer in charge is a vagabond who gets paid for roaming around and not for providing solutions to customer problems. The most unfortunate thing is that there is no one to go to for justice.


I don’t know if Pune Mirror can help in this matter considering your priorities. However, I would sincerely request to check the situation here in MSEB offices once. You will find a scandalous and outrageous story. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Regards,
Sumedh