How to File an Electricity Complaint in Pakistan (DISCO, PMDU & NEPRA)

Before you complain, work out what kind of problem it is

Complaints succeed or fail largely on whether the right thing is being challenged. Roughly speaking there are three kinds, and only two of them are worth escalating.

A metering or reading error

The reading on the bill does not match your meter, or the bill is marked estimated. This is the most winnable category — it is factual and provable with a photograph.

A category or tariff error

Your connection is billed under the wrong tariff code, or you have been billed as unprotected while consistently staying under 200 units. Also winnable, and often worth several months of overcharging.

A rate you simply disagree with

FPA, GST, slab rates and the PTV fee are set nationally. No complaint to your distribution company can change them, and pursuing this will not succeed at any stage of the ladder.

The escalation ladder

Each stage has its own clock, and each stage expects you to have completed the one before it. Skipping a rung usually results in being sent back down.

1. 1

   1. Your distribution company — allow 7 days

   Call helpline 118 or visit your sub-division office. State the problem, hand over evidence, and insist on a written complaint number. Without that number the later stages have nothing to reference. If the office refuses to issue one, that refusal is itself worth recording.

2. 2

   2. Pakistan Citizen Portal (PMDU) — 15 days

   If the company has not resolved it, file through the Citizen Portal app or website. The complaint receives a tracking number and a fifteen-day resolution clock with government monitoring, which in practice moves cases that a sub-division office has been sitting on.

3. 3

   3. NEPRA Consumer Affairs Department

   The regulator's formal channel for billing disputes, tariff misapplication and systemic non-compliance by a distribution company. Submit through NEPRA's CAD portal with your consumer reference number, your contact details and the full history of the case including earlier complaint numbers.

4. 4

   4. Wafaqi Mohtasib (Federal Ombudsman) — 60 days

   The final institutional route, and legally required to decide within sixty days. You must be able to show you already approached the company without relief. The Ombudsman typically convenes a hearing within thirty to sixty days, summoning both you and a senior company representative. Where overbilling is established, the order can require the bill to be corrected and any excess already collected to be adjusted against future bills.

What to submit

• Your reference number, exactly as printed on the bill.
• The disputed bill, plus two or three previous bills for comparison — seasonal context matters.
• A dated photograph of the meter showing the current reading.
• Your CNIC.
• Every complaint number issued so far, with dates. This is what turns a repeated complaint into an escalation.
• A short written statement of what you believe is wrong and what outcome you are asking for.

Detection bills

A detection bill is raised when the company concludes that electricity was consumed without being metered correctly — a faulty meter, tampering, or a period where the meter under-recorded. They frequently cover several months at once and can be very large.

They are also among the most commonly overturned charges, because the company must be able to justify both the period covered and the basis of the calculation. Ask specifically for the assessment working: which months, what assumed consumption, and on what evidence. A detection bill that cannot be broken down is difficult for the company to defend on escalation.

Questions about complaints