CHENNAI: Tangedco's financial controller (Revenue) has sought to initiate necessary action against an assessor at Oragadam in the Chengalpattu distribution Circle for failing to report misuse of domestic tariff by 17 service appartments which should have been charged under commercial tariff after due enquiry.

In a communication to all the Superintendent Engineers of the Distribution Circles in the state, the Tangedco FC said that a new provision was included in the handheld device to capture meter type and misuse of tariff usage in consumer premises while making assessments.

The assessors were instructed to make correct entry of the meter type and appropriate tariff for usage in consumer premises while making assessments through the handheld device as per the field conditions for efficient billing and to arrest leakage of revenue.

"It is very disheartening to notice that even after making provision for easy identification of misuse in routine assessment and repeated instructions to the field officials to identify and arrest leakage of revenue, the enforcement has identified as a sample case around 17 service connections in respect of misuse of tariff wherein, a cluster of service apartments have been billed under LT Tariff IA (domestic) instead of LT Tariff V (commercial), " it said.

The financial controller directed the SEs to take action on war footing to ensure the correctness of appropriate tariff adoption while making the assessment itself. Also to identify the service apartments and to ensure proper tariff classification and effective billing, it added.

The FC pointed out that in the 17 service connections identified in the same location by the enforcement at Oragadam, the assessment staff has selected the option "NO" under misuse of tariff in the HHD and the services billed under domestic instead of commercial tariff while making assessment.

"This proves that the efforts taken by the Revenue / IT wing for implementation of such provision for the ease of doing have been made worthless. Hence, necessary action may be taken on the erring official after conducting necessary enquiry and the action taken thereon may be reported to this office so as to send an appraisal note to the CMD," it said.