IT wing of PSPCL brought laurels; achieved online billing conversion system before time
Kanwar Inder Singh/ royalpatiala.in
The hard work and devotion of the information technology wing of the PSPCL has successfully shifted all 97 offline billing towns to online billing as planned under integrated power development scheme (IPDS) in scheduled time period in spite of the Covid 19 pandemic and other inevitable reasons.
CMD PSPCL A. Venu Prasad and director distribution Er. DPS Grewal has appreciated the hard work, devotion and outstanding contribution of the information technology team for the achievement of the success of the project in scheduled time period.
In a message CMD PSPCL A. Venu Prasad and director distribution Er. DPS Grewal said that with the completion of the 97 online billing towns will facilitate in improving the consumer services and it would also help PSPCL to analyze feeder wise AT&C losses to plug losses and revenue leakage thereby reducing the overall cost of supply to consumers.
Spokesman of the PSPCL disclosed that IPDS IT implementation project is a govt. funded project sanctioned for Rs 73.28 crores. Its main aim is to implement IT infrastructure in PSPCL offices and grids in 97 towns of Punjab. The main advantage to PSPCL under IPDS is shifting of billing of 97 no. Non-SAP Towns with consumers between 5000 to 30000 to an online billing system commonly known as SAP system. Spokesman added that It was targeted to be completed by march 31,2021 but the whole project was delayed in 2020 due to various reasons.
Spokesman also added that even after the 45 days lockdown from march to may 2020, the govt. regulations only allowed 50 % staff and IT organization staff seating arrangement being in a common hall resulted in many positive cases of Covid-19 in IT Organization of PSPCL hampering the progress such that no town was made “Go-Live” till end Sept*.
In October 2020 with only six months to go for completion of the project, the project was given a new leash of life under able leadership of CMD/PSPCL A.Venu Prasad and valuable guidance of director distribution PSPCL Er.DPS Grewal , who laid emphasis on looking for out of box solutions . As a result now the focus of IT team was shifted to how things could be done in an expeditious manner.
In Dec 2020 project picked up speed after resolution of various contractual issues with project management agency and other vendors and four more towns were made ‘Go Live’. In January, 7 more Towns were made Go Live.
As a result of the special drive by the management, all 97 offline billing towns have been migrated to an online billing system. The whole IT team has synergized its efforts and energy to meet the deadline of 31st March 2021 even though PFC has conveyed extension in timeline to 30/06/2021
April 2,2021
