54% of Visayas survey respondents want government to cover system losses

ILOILO CITY — More than half of respondents in the Visayas favor having the government shoulder system loss charges on electricity bills through taxes rather than requiring distribution utilities to absorb the costs from their profits, according to the latest survey by Momentum Research.

The August 2026 National Momentum Survey found that 54% of Visayas respondents preferred government funding, while 31% wanted distribution utilities to pay the costs from their profits.

Another 10.6% said the system loss charge should remain on electricity bills, while 4.4% were unsure.

Nationally, 49.4% favored government funding, while 35.9% preferred that distribution utilities shoulder the cost.

Another 8.4% wanted to retain the charge on electricity bills, while 6.3% were undecided.

The survey used face-to-face interviews with 1,487 Filipino adults on Aug. 18-23.

It has a national margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points at a 95% confidence level, while the margin of error for the Visayas is plus or minus 5.8 percentage points.

System loss refers to electricity that is generated and paid for but lost before reaching consumers.

Technical losses result from heat dissipated through wires and transformers, while nontechnical losses stem from electricity theft, illegal connections, and meter tampering.

Republic Act 7832, or the Anti-Electricity and Electric Transmission Lines/Materials Pilferage Act of 1994, first allowed system loss charges to be passed on to consumers.

The current framework is governed by Republic Act 9136, or the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001.

Under the law, distribution utilities may recover allowable system losses from consumers within limits set by the Energy Regulatory Commission, while losses beyond those caps must be absorbed by the utilities.

The issue gained prominence after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. called in July for system loss charges and the corresponding value-added tax to be removed from electricity bills during his State of the Nation Address.

Energy Secretary Sharon Garin said the government aims to address avoidable losses through better infrastructure, stronger operational discipline, and more effective regulation.

In September, the ERC adopted a new electricity billing format requiring utilities to separately identify allowable system loss charges that are exempt from value-added tax.

The measure provides tax relief and clearer billing but does not by itself eliminate the system loss charge.

Several House bills seeking to prohibit or remove system loss charges from consumers’ electricity bills were also pending before the House committees on Energy and on Ways and Means.