This is my feedback to you on the matter of disconnection of the power supply to my home.
Ms. Surekha called me up from the J P Nagar office of BESCOM and informed me that my bank had dishonoured the ECS payment for August and September, and hence my electricity was cut. She told me that this was also the reason for the lineman demanding the deposit of Rs 1600, and that I should immediately pay the amount due for electricity charges for October by cash.
Fearing another disconnection, I went on Monday, 17th Nov and paid the amount in cash as I was told to do. I then went to the bank, where I found that every ECS had been honoured, and that there were no arrears at all. So I went to the J P Nagar office, and met Ms Surekha. She looked at her computer and showed me that two entries appeared as “cancelled” and said that there might be a software problem; she said that there was some “new software” and that a few homes had difficulties.
I showed her my updated bank passbook with each month’s amount properly debited. I left the details, and my landline and mobile no.s with her. She said she would follow it up.
She told me that the person who could deal with this was away, and would only return on Wednesday and asked me to call after 12 noon on Wednesday, the 19th Nov.
However, this morning, (18th November) two linemen appeared at my door and took down my landline and mobile nos. Shortly thereafter, I got a call from Ms Padmaja, who told me that I had been issued a demand notice in April for the deposit, and the bank had not honoured it. She said that because of this, my electricity was cut off.
I was very much in Bangalore in April, and did not receive either the notice, nor any initmation from the bank that such a demand had been made (I travelled abroad only in June.) Ms Padmaja told me that sometimes if the consumer is not at home, the demand notice is left “near the meter”. Is this any way of ensuring that the consumer gets an important notice, which might result in disconnection? Also, I fail to understand: even if I had not paid the amount in April, why was the power disconnected in October? Ms Padmaja also told me to give standing instructions to the bank to honour any demand notice from BESCOM. On reflection, I am unable to agree with this directive.
I am not getting a single, logical explanation of why my power was disconnected, and why the deposit was demanded and taken in October, and why I was asked to pay the last month’s dues by cash when the ECS is still in effect.
I am worried that my account will once again be debited with the last month’s dues on the date of ECS collection, and I am also worried that at any time my power may get disconnected without any warning, and I may have to run around as I have been doing. I have taken the ECS service precisely to avoid this kind of situation, and yet I find myself in trouble.
I would like a detailed explanation of this as I am unable to understand the different explanations provided by the BESCOM personnel.
I thank you for the prompt response so far, and I look forward to hearing from you again.