The Electricity Company of Ghana has uncovered cases of mobile money fraud in the payment of bills by its customers in the Ashanti region to access certain services.
The discovery comes after some of its customers complained of receiving calls from strange numbers to deposit money into mobile money accounts for meters to be installed or replaced for them.
The power distribution company revealed the fraudsters in most cases called the customers to pay money to a mobile money account to access services such as meter replacement, meter installation, and debt cancellation.
The distributor is cautioning its customers against such fraudulent persons, as it says the company has no mobile money account for transacting payments except through its PowerApp and the short code *226#.
General Manager of ECG in the Ashanti West Region, Ing. George Amoah, highlighted the operations of the fraudsters who usually impersonate workers of the company.
“They reach out to customers via social media or phone calls and ask customers to make payment to certain mobile money numbers for their meters to be installed or replaced. In some instances, they claim it’s installation fee and end up impersonating ECG officials like the District Manager, accountant or Technical Officer,” he explained.
Ing. Amoah bemoaned the rate at which the illegal activity was gaining momentum in the region as these incidents have been reported in Adum, Kokoben, Suame, Danyame, Abuakwa and Ahinsan Districts.
“Just last week, some fraudsters called a customer who had applied for meter with ECG to pay 900 Cedis for the meter to be installed. The customer paid the money and the fraudsters demanded an additional 500 Cedis as installation fee for new service connection to the momo number 0508058638.
“However, the customer became suspicious and visited our office at Adum for clarification before he realized these fraudsters were not officials of the ECG and they stopped picking his calls. There was a similar incident at Breman where an old man paid 2000 Cedis to fraudsters who stopped picking his calls after receiving payment,” he recounted.
With the introduction of the ECG cashless system, customers can only initiate transactions or access their services through the ECG PowerApp which allows them control their payments without any MoMo charge.
Ing. Amoah assured that the company is working with the security agencies to track these unscrupulous individuals to have them face the law.
“We are liaising with the security agencies to bring these perpetrators to book,” he explained.
Ing. Amoah urged the public to disregard misinformation that the power distribution company had no meters to serve its customers.
“With the introduction of the Loss Reduction Project (LRP), ECG had enough meters to service customers who pay for service application and have commenced the replacement of faulty meters to enhance customer satisfaction, operational efficiency and reduce our losses,” he noted.