When your electricity suddenly goes off, what do you do?

For many of us, the first instinct is surprisingly similar. You look out to see if the neighbors’ lights are off too. You check the other side of the road. Someone calls a friend in another part of town. Before long, you are checking WhatsApp groups or social media, hoping somebody knows what has happened.

Then come the questions. Is this a fault or a planned shutdown? Is it only our locality? Has anybody reported it? Are technicians already working on it? Will the electricity return in 20 minutes, three hours, or tomorrow? Too often, the answer is simply: we don’t know. And that uncertainty makes an already frustrating electricity outage worse.

Uganda is presently experiencing genuine electricity reliability challenges. Rapidly growing demand is putting pressure on parts of the network. Some transformers and substations are overloaded. Equipment fails. Trees interfere with power lines. Storms damage infrastructure. And sometimes electricity must deliberately be switched off so that engineers can safely maintain, repair, or upgrade the network. The social media skits, comedy, and other content tell it all.

These problems will not disappear overnight. But there is one thing we can improve much faster than we can construct a substation or reinforce an electricity network: the information we give consumers when things go wrong.

Think about what a simple warning can mean. If a manufacturer knows that electricity will be unavailable between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. on Tuesday, production can be reorganized. A supermarket can make arrangements to protect refrigerated stock. A salon or a welding workshop can decide whether to open. A family can plan around the interruption. The outage remains inconvenient, but at least people can plan.

Unexpected faults are obviously different. Nobody can give advance warning that a transformer will fail at 2:17 p.m. or that a vehicle will knock down an electricity pole in the middle of the night. But an unplanned outage should not become an information blackout.

Once the problem is known, consumers should receive some basic information: what has happened, which areas are affected, whether technicians are attending to it, and when supply is reasonably expected to be restored. And if the repair takes longer than expected, tell people again.

There is nothing particularly sophisticated about this. Airlines tell passengers when a flight is delayed. Banks notify customers when systems are unavailable. Telecommunications companies communicate significant service interruptions. Electricity consumers deserve the same courtesy. More importantly, this is not merely about courtesy; it’s a regulatory requirement, and information about electricity has economic value.

Imagine a small restaurant that keeps opening refrigerators because the owner expects electricity back “any minute.” Imagine a workshop keeping workers idle for four hours because no one knows whether the power will return. Imagine a health facility, school, or business trying to decide whether to activate an alternative power source. Knowing that electricity will probably return at 6 p.m. instead of 2 p.m. changes decisions.

This is why electricity reliability should increasingly be understood as more than keeping the lights on. When things go wrong, the quality of information provided to the consumer is also part of the service. Of course, communication must never become an excuse for poor performance.

Consumers are not asking electricity companies to become better at explaining outages instead of preventing them. They want fewer interruptions, faster restoration, and stronger networks. That distinction matters.

Uganda is investing in transformers, transmission infrastructure, substations and network reinforcement. Those investments are necessary. But the ordinary electricity consumer does not experience a “1,110-transformer replacement program” or a “substation capacity upgrade.” Consumers experience electricity that is either available or unavailable.

Are the lights staying on longer? Are repeated faults in particular neighborhoods reducing? When electricity goes off, is it restored faster? Are planned interruptions communicated early enough for people to prepare? Ultimately, that is how consumers judge progress.

And when the same community repeatedly reports the same faulty transformer, poor voltage, or feeder problem, somebody should eventually ask why the problem keeps recurring rather than simply issuing another complaint reference number. A reference number is useful only when it leads somewhere. This is also where ERA has a responsibility.

The regulator does not repair transformers or dispatch technicians to restore a failed distribution feeder. Those responsibilities belong to the licensed operators. ERA’s responsibility is to protect consumers, establish service standards, monitor performance, and hold electricity companies accountable for meeting those standards. And accountability should ultimately be visible in the consumer’s experience.

Uganda has made significant progress in electricity generation and access. But as the electricity system grows, service expectations must grow with it. Consumers should expect stronger networks, quicker restoration when faults occur, and better communication when electricity must be interrupted.

The current reliability problems will require investment, maintenance, better operational performance, and time to resolve; however, silence certainly makes an outage worse.

When electricity goes off, consumers deserve three simple answers: What happened? What are you doing about it? When can I reasonably expect my power back?

Providing those answers is not public relations.

It is part of providing a good electricity service.

By J. Julius Wandera
Director Corporate & Consumer Affairs