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200 Units vs 201 Units: The Rs 871 Unit
The most expensive single unit of electricity in Pakistan is the 201st. Here is the arithmetic — and why it is not a mistake on your bill.
At 200 units, an unprotected home's energy charge is 200 × Rs 28.91 = Rs 5,782.00. At 201 units it is 201 × Rs 33.10 = Rs 6,653.10. The extra unit costs Rs 871.10 in energy alone — because the new band's rate applies to every unit, not just the extra one.
The rule behind it
The tariff's footnotes give slab benefit to protected consumers only. Everyone else — unprotected and lifeline alike — pays all units at the rate of the band their total lands in. Most bill calculators on the web still split an unprotected bill into blocks (100 units cheap, then the next rate), which produces a gentler, wrong number: at 200 units the telescopic method gives Rs 5,135 against the notified Rs 5,782. If your bill looks higher than a website's estimate, this rule is the first suspect — the bill is usually right and the website wrong. The bill checker detects the telescopic method by name.
The full bills, side by side
| 200 units | 201 units | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy charge | Rs 5,782.00 | Rs 6,653.10 |
| Fixed charge (1 kW) | Rs 300.00 | Rs 350.00 |
| FCA + QTA (current defaults) | Rs 577.34 | Rs 580.23 |
| GST (18%) | Rs 1,198.68 | Rs 1,365.00 |
| Total | Rs 7,858.02 | Rs 8,948.33 |
Core lines only — energy, fixed, FCA, QTA, GST at the current defaults. The total gap is Rs 1,090.31 for one unit: the energy jump, a higher fixed-charge band, and GST levied on all of it.
Every boundary is a cliff
The same step waits at 100, 300, 400, 500, 600 and 700 units — smaller in rupees at the lower bands, larger at the top (crossing 700 moves every unit to Rs 47.20). Two consequences matter practically. First, a home near a boundary gains more from shaving a few units than from any tariff argument: at the 200 edge, five fewer units can be worth over a thousand rupees. Second, households hovering near 200 face the double cost — the heavier month is billed unprotected and it breaks protected status for the six-month count. The protected checker counts your clean months; the units chart shows every step in one table.
What to do with this
Watch the meter in the last week of the reading cycle if you are near a boundary — the reading date, not the calendar month, decides. Shift discretionary load (ironing, pumping, the second AC) across the boundary when you can. And if your usage genuinely lives just above 200, price the appliance loads to find which device is pushing you over.