When the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) launched the PowerApp in February 2020, it was rightly hailed as a major leap in public service delivery. For millions of electricity consumers, the app promised something simple but transformative – convenience, transparency and control. No more long walks to vendors, no more queues, no more uncertainty over whether a credit purchase had gone through. Power, quite literally, was placed in the palms of customers’ hands.
Designed in-house by ECG’s own ICT staff and launched by then Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, the PowerApp was meant to serve about 2.8 million out of ECG’s 3.8 million customers. Through the app or the *226# shortcode for users of non-smartphones, customers could buy electricity credit, pay bills and manage their accounts using mobile money. Beyond convenience, the app also addressed a deeper institutional problem: revenue mobilisation. By reducing cash handling and middlemen, the app improved transparency in purchases and made it harder for revenue to leak through informal channels.
There is no doubt that the ECG PowerApp has changed a lot. Credit purchases are now traceable. Customers can see what they pay for. Transactions leave digital footprints. For many households and small businesses, especially in urban areas, buying electricity credit has become faster and safer. In theory, it is exactly what a modern utility service should look like.
But theory and reality are increasingly drifting apart.
For some time now, users have repeatedly complained about technical glitches, poor connectivity, uncredited payments, failed top-ups and persistent difficulties with meter integration, particularly MMS-compliant meters. These are not minor inconveniences. For a prepaid electricity customer, a failed top-up is not an abstract system error but it is darkness, stalled work, disrupted households and rising frustration.
Recently, ECG announced that it had resolved a technical fault that disrupted electricity credit purchases for customers using MMS-compliant meters on Sunday, December 28, 2025. A follow-up statement the next day assured the public that the problem had been fully fixed. Yet, for many customers, the same challenge persists. Transactions still fail. Credits still do not reflect. Complaints continue.
This is where the problem becomes more serious.
What is the point of a digital process designed to be seamless if it repeatedly makes access more difficult? Technology is meant to remove friction, not replace old frustrations with new ones. When customers are told a problem has been fixed, only to experience it again, public confidence erodes. Slowly but surely, trust in the system gives way to scepticism.
When trust collapses customers begin to abandon the app and return to old ways with physical vendors and cash payments. That regression would not only undermine ECG’s digital transformation agenda but also weaken the very transparency and revenue efficiency the PowerApp was created to achieve.
To be fair, ECG has acknowledged these challenges and has made efforts to resolve system errors, improve connectivity and educate users on proper app usage. But acknowledgement alone is no longer enough. Reliability is the true currency of digital public services. An app that works sometimes is not good enough for a basic utility like electricity.
If ECG wants the PowerApp to remain relevant and trusted, it must move beyond reactive fixes to proactive system strengthening. Meter integration issues must be resolved permanently. Failed transactions must be credited automatically, not after prolonged complaints.
Digital innovation is not just about launching platforms; it is about sustaining them. The ECG PowerApp represents progress and it has already delivered real benefits. But progress is fragile. If seamless access cannot be guaranteed, the very tool designed to modernise power delivery risks becoming another symbol of institutional inefficiency.
The message is simple: convenience must work consistently. Anything less defeats the purpose.
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