Dear Ms.

Brown, Re: Compensation to T&TEC Customers for Good Friday Blackout The Regulated Industries Commission (RIC) appreciates your concern on matters relating to the nationwide loss of power on Friday 29th March, 2013. We wish to put on record that we are actively working on addressing these issues in the interests of customers of the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC). The RIC has already received the interim report on the incident from T&TEC and we are in the process of requesting further information from T&TEC with respect to the cause of the loss of power in Trinidad and Tobago and the length of time taken to restore the electricity supply to its customers. With respect to this matter, the RIC will be guided by the Regulated Industries Commission Electricity (Transmission and Distribution) Order, 2009 in conjunction with the Quality Of Service Standards For The Electricity Transmission And Distribution Sector 2008-2010, Final Decision of November 2008 policy document in its final determination with regard to the specific area of compensation for customers for March 29thpower outage, in instances where T&TEC may have breached the Guaranteed Electricity Standard ( GES1). The Quality of Service Standards, which were gazetted in December 2009, form the basis for T&TECs performance in the area of quality of service and provide the mechanisms for compensatory payment when the targets have not been maintained for the Guaranteed Electricity Standards.

The Guaranteed Electricity Standard (GES1) provides for penalty payments to be made to customers on T&TECs failure to restoresupply within 10 hours of an unplanned outage on the distribution system. The penalty payments are $60.00 for residential customers and $600 for non-residential customers and for each further 12-hour period $60 residential $600 non-residential. However, the current policy document specifically stipulates an exclusion clause for GES1 that reads; There are a range of causes for interruptions, including storms, lighting strikes, falling poles and high winds. T&TEC must manage the network to minimise these interruptions and restore power as quickly as possible. However, interruptions caused by the failure of generation conditions are outside the control of T, faults of or on customers equipment, and faults due to force majeure&TEC and, as such, will be treated as exclusions. These exclusions have to be approved by the RIC.
Given that the March 29th power outage involved the breakdown of the generation system in Trinidad, T&TEC has applied to the RIC for a suspension of the Guaranteed Electricity Standard (GES1) and therefore may not be required to make any penalty payments to customers. The RIC has not yet made its final determination with respect to compensation as consideration is being given to contractual terms and conditions that exist between T&TEC and the supplier of natural gas to the affected generation companies. Thank you again for your concern and I hope we were able to clarify the issues that you have raised and we will inform you of the final determination of this matter in due course. Regards,

Driselle Ramjohn

Corporate Communications Manager REGULATED INDUSTRIES COMMISSION 1st & 3rd Floors, Furness House Cor. Wrightson Road & Independence Square Port-of-Spain Trinidad, W.I. Phone | (868) 625-5384 ext 231 Cell | (868) 310-0343 Fax | (868) 624-2027 Email | ramjohnd@ric.org.tt Website | www.ric.org.tt