Planning office wants energy credit cards discontinued at year-end
The Energy Policy and Planning Office will urge the Energy Policy Administration Committee to scrap the energy-credit-card scheme after it expires at the end of this year, while planning to have PTT shoulder the project's Bt23-million bad debts.
Prasert Sinsukprasert, deputy director-general of the EPPO, said yesterday that the office would soon propose the project’s discontinuation because of a dearth of interest.
The energy card’s credit line is Bt3,000. It gives drivers of taxis and public utility vehicles a discount of Bt3 per kilogram for natural gas for vehicles. NGV is selling for Bt13 per kilogram. The discount can add up to no more than Bt6,000 per month.
The Energy Ministry plans to abolish only the credit card, not the NGV discount.
A ministry source cited the small number of cardholders – only 3,000.
There used to be about 10,000 cardholders.
Credit-card debts have ballooned to about Bt23 million, which will not be a burden on the national budget, as the ministry will have PTT carry the debts.
PTT is said to be ready to shoulder this debt burden before closing the scheme.
"The civil servants who oversaw the energy-credit-card project have retired and it follows a populist policy that does not involve the government budget. It’s all PTT’s money," the source said.
"The bad debt of over Bt20 million is not much for PTT. The company is required to submit the issue to its board for approval of this debt before the project ends."
The energy credit card for motorcycle taxis with a discount of Bt3 per litre for gasohol has not used government money nor has it been approved by the commission, so it came under PTT last year and ended without any notice to the commission.
The energy credit card, one of the democratically elected Pheu Thai Party’s populist policies, was aimed at gaining people easier access to sources of money. Starting on December 1, 2011, this project assisted participating taxi drivers with an NGV discount.
The scheme was soon extended to public buses, tuk-tuks and commuter vans.
In 2012, the ministry established the energy-credit-card scheme for motorcycle taxis, but they were not happy with the conditions, such as only using PTT fuel to fill tanks and being registered as a motorcycle taxi driver.
They also did not want to pile on more debts. Last year, these energy credit cards totalled 1,000.
