The cash strapped UP Power Corporation Limited, in an attempt to augment its billing efficiency and rev up its revenue, has signed an agreement with National Rural Livelihood Mission to enable self-help groups (SHGs) for doorstep collection of electricity bills from consumers.
The SHGs will get Rs 20 for a bill of up to Rs 2,000 and 1 per cent up to Rs 49,999.
UPPCL Chairman Arvind Kumar said this would enable SHGs to create a prepaid wallet with UPPCL by depositing money. Once the SHGs become agents they will be able to receive bill payments on behalf of UPPCL and give receipts.
“This is UPPCL’s way to empower women and help them generate extra income.
An official of UPPCL said that the move would help consumers to pay bills at doorstep without having to visit the office of the UPPCL.
It may be mentioned that the cash starved UPPCL has drawn up a roadmap to improve the financial and operational performance of its discoms by 2024.
The trajectory that it has drawn up include plans to bring down the aggregate technical & commercial (AT&C) losses from the current 30.3 per cent to 15 per cent, reduce average cost of supply (ACS) and average revenue realised (ARR) gap from 85 paise per unit to 70 paise per unit and bring down the distribution losses from the current 18 per cent to 13.3 per cent by March 2024.
It has also set itself the task of scaling up the collection efficiency, which is bordering 85 per cent at present, to 98 per cent by 2024.
