ISLAMABAD: The electricity consumers across the country are estimated to pay around 42 paise per unit additional charges for April to June mostly on account of capacity charges paid to power producers during the second quarter (October-December) of FY26.

The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (Nepra) has called a public hearing on Feb 17 at the request of ex-Wapda distribution companies (Discos) seeking recovery of Rs10.832 billion from consumers under the quarterly tariff adjustment (QTA) mechanism. The recoverable amount is estimated to be a positive QTA of about 42 paise per unit over three billing months.

It may be noted that consumers are currently paying about 33 paise per unit positive QTA on account of similar higher costs (Rs6.06bn) of the first quarter (July-September 2025) since December and expires by the end of the current month. That would be replaced by fresh QTA for the following three months.

The Discos sought adjustments on account of capacity charges, transmission charges & market operator fee, the impact of incremental consumption package announced by the government for industrial and agricultural consumers for three years, besides the impact of transmission and distribution losses on monthly fuel costs and variable operations & maintenance charges for the 2nd quarter of FY2025, i.e. October to December 2025.

The total additional impact of capacity charges comes to about Rs24.25bn for the said quarter. However, these are partly compensated through negative adjustments on account of almost all other factors, including variable O&M (Rs1.655bn), use of service charge (Rs3bn), impact of incremental package (Rs7.5bn) and FCA impact of system losses (Rs1.2bn), bringing down the total additional amount chargable to consumers to Rs10.83bn.

Three out of eleven Discos have sought additional QTA for the second quarter. These include Hyderabad, Peshawar and Quetta Electric Supply companies, seeking negative adjustment of Rs3.5bn, Rs5.1bn and Rs4.1bn, respectively.

On the other hand, Multan Electric has demanded a higher increase of Rs5.6bn, followed by Rs4.8bn for Gujranwala, Rs4.1bn for Islamabad, Rs3.7bn for Lahore, Rs2.9bn for Sukkur, and Rs1.9bn for Faisalabad Electric. Newly created Discos Tribal Electric and Hazara Electric have sought Rs303 million and Rs140m additional recovery.

Once approved, the QTA would also apply to K-Electric. However, the Quarterly Tariff Adjustments (QTAs), the Debt Service Surcharge (DSS), and negative FCAs are not applicable to eligible consumers of the government-announced special tariff package for incremental consumption.

Published in Dawn, February 5th, 2026