NEWS & UPDATES

KUCHING
19 JULY 2020

Sarawak’s Ministry of Utilities and Sarawak Energy continue to work together to ensure assistance under various schemes for those most in need to get connected with electricity supply.

“The Connection Charges subsidy effective early this year was announced for low income urban homeowners for electricity connection to their new houses. This is aimed at alleviating the financial burden for these new homeowners most in need of assistance to meet the cost of connecting electricity from the main power lines to their homes,” said Dato Sri Dr Stephen Rundi anak Utom, Minister for Utilities.

Under this package, electricity connection fees amounting to RM5,000 and below will be completely absorbed by the State Government.

For connection fees that range from RM5,000 to RM10,000, the State Government will subsidise 70 per cent of the cost and customers only need to pay the remaining 30 per cent.

“We have allocated a total of RM8mln for the Connection Charges subsidy programme for the duration of 2020. Almost 200 households have qualified for the subsidy with a cumulative RM600,000.00 in connection charges waived or discounted since January,” he explained.

Connection Charges is the amount to be paid by a customer who requires a new connection. They are variable and computed based on a standard Schedule of Rates from Connection Charges Guidelines 2019 of Syarikat SESCO Berhad, the operations arm of Sarawak Energy.

It is applicable for first time individual residential customers applying for single phase supply up to a maximum capacity of 10KVA.

Connection charges normally include per house fee, installation and material costs, capacity charges and meter fees where applicable. The charges do not include internal wiring works which is to be undertaken and borne by the homeowner themselves.

Since its implementation, the subsidy has especially helped to support those living at low cost housing areas and residences built as part of government-aided programmes throughout Sarawak.

To date a total of 187 homeowners have benefited from the subsidy of which 162 were eligible for free connection while the remainder had their charges of between RM5,000 to RM10,000 discounted by 70 per cent.

Datu Haji Sharbini Suhaili, Sarawak Energy Group Chief Executive Officer said, “Our Retail team can help to explain to new homeowners on the eligibility requirements for this subsidy and are ever ready to extend assistance. We advise homeowners to approach us directly to avoid being misinformed on the subsidy. This is also to ensure electricity connection from the main power lines to your homes is done safely by competent Sarawak Energy personnel or registered contractors.”

For enquiries, do contact Sarawak Energy’s customer care centre at 1300-88-3111, email at customercare@sarawakenergy.com or via the ‘SEB cares’ mobile application.