Nigeria’s electricity distribution companies collected N603.64 billion from customers in the second quarter of 2026, a small step up from the previous three months, even as the amount of power they drew from the grid shrank.
The figures come from the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission’s latest quarterly report. The 11 companies, known as DisCos, took in slightly more cash than the N597.56 billion they collected in the first quarter. Collection efficiency rose 2.11 percentage points to about 81%, as they recovered N603.64 billion of the N744.67 billion they billed.
But the money is only half the picture.
Average offtake, meaning the electricity the DisCos actually take from the national grid, fell to 3,197.03 megawatt hours per hour from 3,309.48 in the first quarter. That is a 3.4% decline. The companies pulled 94.07% of the capacity available to them, down from about 97% in the previous quarter. Altogether they received 6,982.32 gigawatt hours of electricity in the period and billed customers for just 5,812.31 gigawatt hours.
That gap is where the trouble sits. The DisCos received electricity valued at N946.57 billion but billed for N744.67 billion, leaving roughly N201.90 billion worth of power supplied and never invoiced. Their combined aggregate technical, commercial and collection losses came in at 36.23%, slightly better than the 37.44% in the first quarter but still 19.31 percentage points above the 2026 target. NERC put the revenue lost to that overshoot at N129.07 billion. Every DisCo missed its target, and Kaduna fared worst.
Performance varied widely by region. Benin DisCo posted the highest collection efficiency at 92.68%, followed by Ikeja at 92.20% and Eko at 89.39%. Port Harcourt, Abuja and Ibadan also cleared 80%.
The DisCos owed N410.38 billion to the power market in the quarter and paid N385.44 billion, or roughly 94%. NERC said seven of them met their obligations to the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading company in full.
The weaker offtake did carry one benefit for government. The federal subsidy bill for the quarter fell by N37.06 billion to N321.26 billion, a drop of about 10% from the first quarter. NERC said the lower requirement came mainly from reduced offtake rather than from better remittances. Across the first half of the year, the subsidy totaled N679.58 billion, down 35.27% from N1.05 trillion in the same period of 2025.
Still, subsidies covered close to half of what generation companies invoiced the DisCos, which came to N647.72 billion. Tariffs remain below the cost of supplying power, and the regulator’s numbers suggest the gap is far from closed.
For customers, the quarter offers a mixed message. More of what gets billed is being paid. Less power is flowing in the first place.
