ICE Being Asked To Reimburse ¢1.1 Billion
Colones To Customers
The Autoridad Reguladora de los Servicios
Públicos (Aresep) - regulator of public
services - is looking for the Instituto
Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE) - the
state monopoly on electrical services - to
give back electricity customers some ¢1.1
billion colones for the nine days it stalled
the rate decrease.
On Monday, Aresep officials say they filed
an appeal with the Tribunal Contencioso
Administrativo to force ICE to reimburse
customers for its stall tactics, when it
filed an appeal with the same court to have
the Aresep electrical rate decrease
cancelled.
The rate reduction was to have taken effect
on September 1. The Tribunal temporarily
suspended the rate reduction while it hear
arguments on a motion filed by ICE. The
tribunal did not hand down a decision until
September 9, voting in favour of the rate
reduction, which took effect on September
10.
Thus customers were left to pay the higher
rates nine days longer than they should
have, and that is the basis of the Aresep
filing, arguing that article 34 of the
Autoridad sets out that any changes in
public prices and services are effective on
the day of publication in the official
government daily, La Gaceta. The only
exception to this rule are gasoline prices,
that take effect one day following
publication.
The reimbursement by ICE has also the
support of the Defensoría de los Habitantes,
who on Monday sent a letter to Fernanado
Herrero, the regulador general, to take
action.
Bothe Aresep and the Defensoría see no
justification that legitimizes ICE pocketing
the reduction amount for the nine days.
The rate reduction was published on
September 1.
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