Patiala: A prolonged strike by outsourced meter readers has left thousands of domestic power consumers in Punjab facing inflated and consolidated electricity bills, with some receiving bills as high as Rs 1.5 lakh covering the past five to six months.Patiala-based Senior Citizens’ Welfare Society, Urban Estate, on Wednesday wrote to Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) chairman-cum-managing director (CMD) Basant Garg, demanding corrective measures. PSPCL officials and engineers, however, said the billing disruption was caused by the ongoing strike by meter readers and glitches arising from software transition.According to the society, domestic consumers with a connected load above 10 kW, who were required to be billed monthly, received consolidated bills for six to seven months. In several cases, the bills ranged between Rs 50,000 and Rs 1.5 lakh.The grievances are in line with an internal PSPCL memo, which said 9.6 lakh non-smart meter consumers were issued estimated, or ‘N-code’, bills during the May-June 2026 billing cycle because of the strike. Another 92,643 smart meter consumers were also issued estimated bills due to technical connectivity issues.The memo said 1.5 lakh non-smart meter consumers received estimated bills exceeding Rs 5,000, while 1.1 lakh consumers received bills ranging from Rs 1,000 to Rs 5,000. Among smart meter users, 27,617 consumers were issued estimated bills of over Rs 5,000.Consumers demanded suspension of estimated billing. O P Garg, coordinator and auditor of the Senior Citizens’ Welfare Society, urged PSPCL to resume actual meter-based billing, rectify inflated average-based bills and waive late-payment surcharges and penalties on disputed bills.PSPCL chief engineer (meters) Vikas Sharma said that of the 9.5 lakh consumers issued N-code bills, around 6 lakh fell in the zero-bill category. He added that about 22,000 non-smart meter consumers were billed between Rs 1,000 and Rs 5,000 on an estimated basis.Sharma said around 2,000 outsourced meter readers had been on strike, demanding their absorption as regular PSPCL employees.
