KINGSTON, Jamaica — The Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) is reporting that the island’s utility companies paid out in excess of $34 million for service breaches, during the April – June quarter of 2017.

The OUR stated that the sum was either paid out as a result of actions taken by them or as compensation for breaches of the Guaranteed Standards, and added that the data is contained in its latest quarterly performance report.

Through actions by the OUR, $661,528.67 was secured for utility customers during the review period, the OUR said in a release today.

Of this amount, the National Water Commission (NWC), at 87 per cent, accounted for the greatest share with the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) and Digicel accounting for the remaining 12 per cent and one per cent respectively.

The JPS compliance report on its performance on the Guaranteed Standards indicated that 15,999 breaches were committed during the review period. This represents a 40 per cent drop in the number of breaches compared to the preceding quarter. These breaches attracted compensatory payments of $32,564,549 million, all of which was paid out by way of automatic compensation.

The standards with the highest incidents of breaches related to Estimated Bills (which restricts JPS to sending more than two consecutive estimates without a penalty) and Estimation of Consumption (which prescribes the method to be used by JPS when calculating estimated consumption).

Both standards account for approximately 96 per cent of breaches and compensatory payments.

The NWC’s compliance report on the Guaranteed Standards scheme indicated that there were 825 breaches, representing a 42 per cent increase in the number of breaches over the preceding period. These 825 breaches had a potential pay-out of approximately $2.6 million.

However, actual payments amounted to $1,026,568.20, representing 39 per cent of total potential payments. The payments were made by way of automatic credits to the affected accounts.

The standards with the highest incidents of breaches were: Exceptional Meter Reading, Meter Reading and Access.

The OUR’s quarterly performance report can be accessed on its website: www.our.org.jm.