In the Electricity Distribution Sector, Customer and Public Rights

Customer and Public Rights in the Distribution Sector; Electricity distribution services were carried out by the State under the name of TEK (Turkish Electricity Authority) and TEDAS (Turkey Electricity Distribution Co.), while the services carried out were inspected on behalf of the Institution through the Inspection Board. So the Government would oversee its own business.

Although the Specialization of Distribution Companies has taken a year, there has been no audit on behalf of the Public in the privateized distribution companies, and it is seen that there are practices that we follow from the press or that we have witnessed in person, contrary to the laws and regulations. As a result of these irregular practices, both public and consumer grievances are involved.

The company, which owns the distribution license, tenders the works in the construction of the facilities owned by Tedas and makes them through subcontractors, while underting the temporary acceptance of these constructions itself and conducting the role of both the tender authority and the supervisory authority. How healthy it would be for the contractor to carry out audits and acceptances is a separate problem. At the same time, no tender sample has been found in an application such as doing both the work and the audit and acceptance.

In the Distribution Sector, Customer and Public Rights – Electricity Market Customer Service Regulation

EPDK's 12.10.2011 date and numbered 28082 published in the Official Gazette "

There is no audit activity in this matter, even though there is a "REVIEW AND SUPERVISION OF THE ACTIVITIES OF THE PRODUCTION AND DISSTRIATION COMPANIES OPERATING IN THE ELECTRICITY MARKETS"

Although the ELECTRICITY MARKET IS clearly described in the relevant clauses of the CUSTOMER SERVICES REGULATION, companies that own distribution licenses and operate distribution companies continue to operate contrary to this regulation.

In the Customer Service Regulation, electricity cutting, denunciation, leak detection and accrual are described in detail, but they actually apply illegal accrual to the customer's second invoice without cutting the power.

If there is illegal use, there must be a leakage report, a sealing record, and it is mandatory to determine the power and duration of illegal use, but these companies apply leakage tariffs to all of the customer's consumption at that time.

In addition, there is a complete lack of supervision in business and investment matters, the Company approves the investment program to the EPDK, which is true, this investment program is monitored for physical realization, but there are dozens of questions on the company side, such as whether the company's costs are mixed, even the slightest operating cost is shown as investment, and temporary acceptances are created, even though the owner of the facility is public, what is the fate of the disassembly materials, scrapped and then used in the construction of new facilities to collect the price from the Institution through tariffs.

Article 21 of the Customer Service regulation. (c) although expressly stated in article 10, either invoices are not communicated ten days before the due date of payment or on the last pay day subscriber electricity is debited due to undue debt.

So far, 12 electricity distribution areas have been transferred to companies that have obtained Distribution Licenses through privatization, and as of the end of 2008, the total number of subscribers in these 12 countries is 16,097,800. (Except Kayseri and Surrounding Elk.A.S.)

Electricity Distribution Zone Subscriber Numbers

Source:EPDK

This number of subscribers corresponds to approximately 53% of the total number of Tedas, in other words, the services received by 16,000,000 electricity subscribers and investments of hundreds of millions of TL of 12 region are completely out of control.

Taking these numbers into account, the number of subscribers being serviced through Private Companies is more than the population of many states, while the amount of investments in 2012 is above the amount of loans that many states have been trying for months to obtain from the IMF and the World Bank. Under any circumstances, it is clear that they are not an amount to be underestimated, not as a number of subscribers or as investment amounts.

Customer and Public Rights in the Distribution Sector – Electricity Outage Compensation

In addition, epdk's provisions "REGULATION ON THE SUPPLY OF ELECTRICITY ENERGY OFFERED IN THE DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM IN THE ELECTRICITY MARKETS" stated the maximum duration of power outages within one year, and the damages payable to consumers by the distribution company with interruptions exceeding this period are also specified.

Some distribution companies ensure that their faults remain in their own regions by making a ROOT (Cutter Measuring Cabinet) before transformer centers, instead of rehabilitating their networks and doing maintenance, so that network failures in their responsibilities are reflected on the TEİAs side and they are not penaled, and this practice is nothing more than a waste of public resources.

Although there is such extensive information on behalf of consumers, customers do not know their rights, and even if they know their rights, they do not get results when they report their complaints to the distribution company that has obtained a Distribution License, except that they do not know the authorities to pass on their complaints to the Governor's Office and prefectures in general, and it is not possible to get any results as they wasted their time.

Distribution Companies may provide each customer with a warning letter on the invoice stating a point of resolution where they can learn their rights and communicate their complaints while at the same time giving electricity bills within the month, and a website or call center can be created for this job.

Electricity Distribution Companies Call Centers

Although some distribution companies say that they have set up a call center and also offer access to wishes and complaints on their web pages, they generally do not respond positively to any requests, and when you say that there is a power outage of 15 hours a month on a 100-dwelling site, they immediately go on the defensive as if you had a mistake, whereas if the consumer could call the right, there is a lot of information, such as both interruption and voltage information, within the electronic power meters belonging to the subscribers on that site. In addition, the distribution company official who responds without measuring the research either lacks this information or does not take the consumer seriously. It happens to 16,000,000 consumers and public resources under all conditions.

I want to maintain my belief that the Chairman or CEOs of Distribution Companies are well-intentioned, but they may have resorted to such unlawful practices to bring revenue to the company and highlight the image of successful unit managers responsible for the implementation.

Some companies have at least their own internal audit units, but it's not clear what's in their job description, what they're supervising. I don't think an internal audit focused only on its internal dynamics will help the company with the issues I mentioned above.

While operating in the energy field, the biggest shortcoming behind the sinking of ENRON, the 7th largest company in the United States, which went bankrupt in December 2011, was a lack of control.

Coskun Tezel