M&E Advisors: Eskom revenue is overstated by billions of rands

On Friday, the National Energy Regulator (NERSA) hearings, centred on the Notified Maximum Demand Rules (NMDR) concluded in Pretoria.

Ted Blom, a partner at Mining & Energy Advisors (M&E), revealed that Eskom's revenue is highly exaggerated. The numbers, according to Blom, are overstated by billions of rands.

Eskom allegedly misapplies rules around maximum demand charges In a statement that was released by M&E Advisors on Tuesday, Blom noted that

Although previous irregularities uncovered by Blom amounted to hundreds of Billions of rands through inflated expenditure and asset valuations on the expenditure side, these new skeletons illustrate how Eskom has been misapplying the rules around notified maximum Demand charges, reflected in customer accounts as Network charges from possibly as early as 2004.

Blom has been requested by Nersa to investigate how Eskom since 2013, and possibly as early as 2004, has charged up to R275.04/ Kva network capacity charges as a penalty of over ten times the actual charge which should be no more than R22.92/Kva.

Read Eskom says Soweto residents owe R15 billion in unpaid electricity bills

Blom: Eskom targets municipalities and industrial customers Blom was able to identify that the excess charges were mainly applied to industrial and municipal customers.

The exact impact on household customers will still need to be determined but is estimated to amount to thousands of rands per household over the relevant period. This explains why many customers receive excessively high accounts despite no usage during shutdown periods. Blom added.

Read Eskom running out of coal, warns of possible load shedding

Blom further went on to identify Eskom as the possible reason why many of these facilities fail to deliver optimal performances in serving their communities.

It is a slippery slope that affects every South African that can't live without electricity. According to Blom, Eskom overcharges municipalities and industrial customers, who in turn, increase the prices of electricity to balance the exorbitant expense of power in their books.

M&E Advisors have revealed that Blom is currently preparing to lay charges on the power utility related to fraud.

Tags: Eskomfraud

LINK:	https://www.thesouthafrican.com/me-advisors-eskom-revenue-overstated-b...
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