Eleven electricity distribution companies (DisCos) recorded N198.25bn in billing losses in the first quarter of 2026, despite the Federal Government incurring a N358.32bn electricity subsidy obligation during the same period.
The First Quarter 2026 report released by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) showed that although the government continued to absorb a substantial portion of electricity costs to keep tariffs below cost-reflective levels for many consumers, distribution companies were still unable to bill a significant share of the energy supplied to them.
According to the report, the total value of electricity delivered to the 11 DisCos stood at N955.19bn between January and March 2026.
However, only N756.93 bn was billed to customers, resulting in a billing efficiency of 79.24 per cent and leaving N198.25bn in electricity unbilled.
The billing efficiency also declined by 2.79 percentage points from 82.03 per cent recorded in the fourth quarter of 2025, indicating a worsening performance.
The subsidy obligation during the quarter totalled N358.32bn, comprising N126.48bn in January, N116.34bn in February, and N115.50bn in March.
Also, the DisCos struggled to recover revenues from customers.
Of the N756.93bn billed during the quarter, only N597.56bn was collected, translating to a collection efficiency of 78.95 per cent, slightly lower than the 79.36 per cent achieved in the preceding quarter.
The combined effect of weak billing and revenue collection pushed the industry’s Aggregate Technical, Commercial and Collection (ATC&C) loss to 37.44 per cent, significantly above the 16.92 per cent target set under the 2026 Multi-Year Tariff Order (MYTO).
NERC said the ATC&C loss represented a cumulative revenue loss of N140.64bn during the quarter and was 2.54 percentage points worse than the 34.90 per cent recorded in the last quarter of 2025.
The commission noted that all 11 DisCos failed to meet their ATC&C loss targets, with Kaduna Electricity Distribution Company posting the poorest performance.
During the period, Kaduna DisCo recorded an actual ATC&C loss of 69.66 per cent against a regulatory target of 18.18 per cent.
However, despite the operational shortcomings, the DisCos improved their remittances to the electricity market.
NERC said the utilities received a cumulative upstream invoice of N421.18bn, comprising N331.40bn payable to the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc (NBET) for generation costs and N89.78bn for transmission and market operator services.
The companies remitted N396.23bn, representing 94.08 per cent of the total invoice, leaving an outstanding balance of N24.95bn.
This marked an improvement over the 92.71 per cent remittance performance recorded in the previous quarter.
The report also showed progress in the country’s metering programme.
A total of 357,495 electricity meters were installed during the quarter, up 10.38 per cent from the 323,864 meters deployed in the fourth quarter of 2025.
Most of the installations were executed under the Distribution Sector Recovery Programme (DISREP), which accounted for 129,224 meters, followed by the Meter Asset Provider (MAP) framework with 118,681 meters, the Meter Acquisition Fund (MAF) with 97,992 meters, while DisCo-financed and vendor-financed schemes accounted for the balance.
According to the report, as of the end of March 2026, 7.32 million of Nigeria’s 12.39 million active electricity customers had been metered, representing a national metering rate of 59.13 per cent.
The quarter also witnessed continued instability on the national grid, with two system disturbances recorded, a total system collapse on January 23 and a partial grid collapse on January 27.
(The Whistler)
