Power utility PPC debtors could be given another chance to service electricity bill arrears through an installment-based payback program as a result of a wider debt-payment plan just forwarded by the government for consultation.

Besides PPC customers, authorities also intend to make this payback offer available to debtors owing amounts to a range of other entities, including banks, social security funds and the tax department.

An online registration process is being planned for applications.

However, interested parties will need to accept the lifting of banking and tax secrecy terms to become eligible for the payback plan.

This condition will be set so that authorities can cross-examine personal assets, both in Greece and abroad, to avoid attracting, to the program, individuals deemed as financially capable but unwilling to fully honor payback program commitments, as has been the case all too often in previous efforts.

Many such individuals have exploited previous PPC payback programs by registering, paying deposits and, in some cases, early installments, to protect themselves from immediate power supply cut threats, before disappearing from the picture.

PPC’s debtors, including businesses, owe the utility unpaid receivables worth 2.7 billion euros. Over 580,000 financially capable but unwilling customers, or strategic electricity bill dodgers, as they are commonly referred to locally, owe PPC an estimated sum of 545 million euros.

In addition, 895,000 customers who have switched from PPC to other electricity suppliers have left behind electricity-bill arrears estimated at one billion euros.