Changes have been effected by the City of Ekurhuleni on the electricity tariffs and the supply of Free Basic Electricity (FBE) from 100 kWh to 50 kWh units applicable to customers registered and deemed to be indigents, as of July 1.
The citys Free Basic Electricity allocation and funding are governed by the Free Basic Electricity National Policy as well as guidelines and grants received from National Treasury.
Both the guidelines and grants received from National Treasury are as per the FBE National Policy which is50kWh units per month per registered and deemed indigent only.
Since the approval of the provision of Free Basic Services by the national government, the city, therefore, absorbed the funding of the additional 50kWh units of the current 100kWh units provided to registered indigents as well as the full 100kWh units to tariff A (IBT) customers who did not qualify as indigents.
In addition, the City of Ekurhuleni has a substantial amount of approved indigents that will qualify for the 50kWh units, but there are also huge numbers of deemed indigents. Therefore, the city encourages customers who qualify in terms of the city
s indigents policy to apply, this will allow approved registered indigent customers to continue to receive the 50kWh FBE units.
To put the above in context the following might assist to clarify the impact. As from July 1:
A- Approved registered and deemed indigent customers on tariff A IBT will
With their first transaction of the month receive only 50kWh FBE as opposed to 100kWhFBE units previously received.
Pay for all units above the 50kWh FBE units.
B- Customers not qualifying and not approved as indigents on tariff A IBT will
Receive 0 (zero) FBE units as opposed to 100kWh FBE units currently received.
Pay for all units in all Tariff A (IBT) blocks
The above approach will be uniformly implemented to the Metro electricity customers regardless of whether a customer is supplied with electricity by Eskom or the City of Ekurhuleni.
Solar Photo Voltaic (PV) Embedded Generation (EG) export credit
An exciting addition to the city’s Supply of Electricity tariff structures is the introduction of a Solar PV Embedded Generation export credit component to all Residential, Business and Industrial tariffs that has a fixed charged component.
What does this mean
customers who install Solar PV panels on their rooftops and generate more than what they consume during the day.
These excess units generated will be measured by an approved meter and the customer will with their bill at the end of the processed billing receive a rand value credit for these units. The citys by-laws, related approved policies and schedule of tariff conditions will apply.
Importantly to note is that residential customers who are on Tariff A will move to Tariff B should Solar PV be installed.
