Explain This to Me

Just got my electricity bill. We do not get a whole lot of electricity in this place. Well, more than most Lebanese, but definitely not 24 hours a day. I should not complain, because I do not get a very regular bill either. Only this week have I received the electricity bill over the months of  . . . . .  July and August of 1212.

Explain this to me; It is all computerized, so how come they cannot produce a timelier bill. July and August? That’s like 4 months ago! At least the amount they quoted seemed decent.

I remember last summer, when I came back from holidays, I got the unlikely bill of somewhere in the 7 million pounds. Now I am on the anal side in some matters, and I have kept spread sheets of my energy consumption ever since I moved into this house in 1993. Heck, I can produce all bills and record of payments. And so I knew that a sudden increase of some 200% was near impossible, unless the entire neighborhood had hooked onto my line. This was of course my first thought, and so we checked the lines, but no, it was all clear; I was not secretly maintaining the family next door who were running all their AC’s day and night.

Last week on the Corniche

I complained to the man who comes to pick up the money.

Yes, they still do this manually. You can pay your electricity bill by automatic bank transfer as well these days, but then you are basically no longer in control of situation like this when – as I just explained – you get a sudden and explainable increase of some 200% on your monthly bill. And this was the official, computer printed bill we are talking about; not the little green paper with the amount written so you know what to have ready when he comes by and picks up the money.

And so I complained to the man who picks up the money, that there was no way I owed them some 7,000,000 when my bill in the past 19 years had never been higher than half of that amount.

“Okay, what would you like it to be?” the man said.

"Excuse me?” I asked.

“,How much would you like to pay” he clarified.

“Nothing. I want to pay nothing. I want to pay what I owe them, not a penny more,” I replied.

And the week after he came with a bill that was probably the lowest amount I have had to pay in many many years for my electricity.  Computer printed, again.

Ever since then, we have had ‘normal’ bills again, with amounts in the range that fit previous years. But since then I always wonder if my electricity bill really displays my actual amount, or whether they have just been filling any number for I am being screwed for the past 18 years as well.