Despite noting that sections of some parishes are still without electricity, the Jamaica Public Service (JPS) says it has met its post-Hurricane Beryl restoration deadline of August 12. 

Following outages caused by the passage of Hurricane Beryl on July 3 and numerous missed deadlines, the Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR) directed JPS to restore power to affected customers by yesterday or face a fine.

In a statement today, JPS says the majority of customers who were impacted by outages related to the hurricane now have power.

Of the company’s 692,000 customers, approximately 682,000 now have supply.

This means some 10,000 customers are still without electricity.

JPS says the restoration works have seen the return to normalcy for all parishes except St. Elizabeth. 

It says there a few isolated outages remaining mainly in Westmoreland, Manchester and rural St. Andrew due to access challenges including landslides and blocked roads. 

JPS notes that it is working with its partners to gain access to these areas.

Having completed restoration of the rest of the island, JPS says it will now focus on reconnecting St. Elizabeth customers to the grid.

In the meantime, JPS says it recognizes that some customers in restored areas may still be experiencing outages due to unique circumstances for example, where they were restored after Hurricane Beryl, but have since lost supply, or where individual customers within communities are still without supply.

In these cases, JPS asks the affected customers to make reports via the myjps mobile app or the customer care centre at 888-225-5577 / 888-935-5577.

JPS is also urging customers to have a licensed electrician check their wiring, grounding and potheads, to ensure that their property is ready to safely receive supply.