The Department of Energy sent show cause orders to 20 retail stations to explain why they increased pump prices ahead of the anticipated implementation of the higher excise tax on petroleum products.
Energy assistant secretary Leonido Pulido III said around 30 percent or 2,040 retail stations out of the 6,800 stations nationwide complied with the implementation of the higher excise tax under Republic Act No. 10963 or the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion Act.
Pulido said the department sent show cause letters to 20 stations, mostly dealer-owned in Metro Manila, which the department validated to have implemented the Train impact on pump prices.
“We have asked them to explain and justify if indeed their old stocks have been depleted,” the official said.
Records from the department showed four oil firms implemented higher excise taxes on Jan. 5 to 14, including Caltex, Petron, Shell and Flying V.
Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, head of the Senate committee on energy, called the attention of the department for its alleged failure to efficiently monitor the compliance of the oil firms to the Train Law.
“For DoE, [they] can do better. We are relying on the DoE to protect the consumers,” Gatchalian said, as he asked the department to come up with findings and ensure that the public was not made to pay for higher prices based on the old inventory of the oil companies.
Gatchalian said increases in electricity and fuel prices should only take effect once the old reserves were depleted and new inventories, which should have entered the country after Jan. 1, 2018, were already being used.
“We still have 12 days to go for the full brunt [of the Train] to be felt by consumers,” he said.
Under the Train Law, gasoline prices should go up by P2.97 per liter, kerosene by P3.36 per liter and diesel by P2.80 per liter. Cooking gas will also go up by P1.12 per per kilogram.
Power rates under the franchise area of Manila Electric Co. are also expected to go up by P0.07 per kilowatt-hour.
Meanwhile, Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi called for a meeting with distribution utilities to discuss the effective and appropriate implementation of the power-related provisions of the Train Act.