Tuesday, 12 May 2020: In order to help alleviate the impact of the COVID-19 national lockdown
on indigent households, Eskom today launched its communication campaign aimed
at raising awareness of the longstanding Free Basic Electricity (FBE)
programme, which is targeted at giving limited free electricity to indigent
households.
Qualifying households, in terms of the government’s
policy of providing support to the unemployed, low-earning, the destitute and
the elderly, are encouraged to approach their municipalities to register as
indigents in order to collect their allocated free basic electricity every
month.
“Customers on municipalities’ indigent household
registers have the right to collect a minimum 50 kiloWatt hours (kWh) of
electricity for free every month, which can also be higher, depending on the
municipality,” said Monde Bala, Group Executive: Distribution.
“Unfortunately a large number of indigent households don’t exercise their
right, either because they are unaware of the free basic electricity, or
because they have not registered with the municipality.”
Once registered with the municipality, the customer’s
details are loaded on the Eskom system where they get credited with free
electricity tokens.
As at end March 2020, Eskom had 900 000 registered indigent
customers for free basic electricity but only 700 000 people are
collecting their FBE tokens. Eskom is working with municipalities to ensure that
indigent households receive the free electricity allocated by the government.
“The partnership with municipalities will go a long way to helping cushion the
indigent households from the full impact of COVID-19 lockdown,” said Bala.
Customers who
qualify for FBE but who are not currently collecting it, must approach their
municipality and register to receive their free allocation.
ENDS