Telangana: Over 7L people to be charged ACD for non-payment of bills

Hyderabad: Telangana State Northern Power Distribution Company Limited (TSNPDCL) said that 7.16 lakh consumers who failed to pay their bills will be subjected to Advance Consumption Demand (ACD) charges.

The power distribution company’s chairman and managing director A Gopal Rao on Thursday said that the pending bills in Telangana totalled about Rs 305 crore.

“The decision was in line with the guidelines issued by the Telangana Electricity Regulatory Commission (TSERC) and notices regarding ACD charges were issued in January,” remarked the director.

Gopal Rao further informed that the interest on the ACD charges would be calculated as per RBI guidelines and would be adjusted in the consumer’s bill.

“The TSNPDCL has been collecting ACD, a refundable security charge from consumers by asking them to pay an amount equal to their electricity bill for two months,” added Gopal Rao.

“ACD is based on the monthly average power consumed by each consumer for a year and collected in order to provide better services to consumers,” said the director.

Dismission rumours being circulated on social media regarding ACD, Gopal Rao said that the TSNPDCL has not planned to increase the power tariff and claimed the news to be baseless.