Nepra increases power cost by 52 paisas per unit

ISLAMABAD: The federal government on Monday has approved an electricity tariff increase of Rs0.5194 per unit, putting an extra burden of about Rs12.6 billion on the shoulders of power consumers.

The per unit hike is applicable to all categories of consumers except lifeline consumers, Incremental Consumption Package units and prepaid consumers.

The positive quarterly adjustment will be collected in three months, i.e., September, October and November 2026, at a rate of Rs0.5194 per kWh.

During the hearing it was proposed that the per unit adjustment of Rs33 billion quarterly adjustment asked by DISCOs be collected in four months, i.e., September, October, November and December 2026, instead of three months.

But the Authority said that Nepra has computed an adjustment of about Rs12 billion, which is far less than what was being demanded by the DISCOs and, therefore, decided to stick to the existing three months’ recovery period.

It also decided to extend the quarterly adjustment to the K-Electric consumers for three months, as above. As such, the K-Electric consumers will also be charged Rs0.5194 per kWh with the same exemptions of lifeline, Incremental Consumption Package and prepaid consumers.

Nepra directed all DISCOs to file their requests for quarterly adjustment immediately after the close of each quarter to ensure timely processing.

The distribution companies were also directed to provide category-wise details of increases or decreases in sales for each quarter compared with reference sales and actual sales during the corresponding period of the previous year.

For industrial consumers, the information must be provided separately for B1, B2, B3 and B4 categories.

The authority directed that future hearings include an analysis of sales and maximum demand indicator variances and their impact on quarterly adjustment amounts to provide a clearer understanding of the data.