The Managing Director of the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWCL), Dr. Clifford Brimah, has said the company could have alerted the public on the cumulative increase in water tariffs following the restoration of a 10 percent component for the running of the Accra Desalination Plant.
The restoration, which came alongside the increase in 8.1 per cent increment in the water tariff, appears as an 18.1 percent increase in the amount paid for water.
This has led to complaints from some consumers who felt they were being fleeced by the water company.
“We needed to have communicated further. Probably we should have done that,” Dr. Brimah admitted on the Citi Breakfast Show on Friday.
But he reminded that the restoration of the 10 percent component should not be considered as part of the tariff increase.
“The customers are complaining because they enjoyed between February and June this year some reductions in tariffs because PURC penalised Ghana Water Company… the penalty was supposed to be for four months.”
“If people want to do calculations on the increase in their tariffs, the reference point is January. The reference point cannot be June,” he added.
In September 2018, PURC ordered the temporary 10.08 percent tariff reduction on prevailing rates for all customers because of the GWCL’s non-compliance with tariff decisions and regulatory directives concerning the Accra Desalination Plant.
Affected customers were to receive some refunds totalling GHs14,097,146.
The figure represented the five months’ tariff income “unfairly over-recovered by GWCL” between March 15, 2018, and September 15, 2018.
The PURC said its monitoring exercises revealed that the desalination plant was not operating but customers were still being charged the 10 percent levy.
The Accra Desalination Plant was shut down to allow for the renegotiation of its contract which is said to be costing government GHc6 million monthly.
