As an answer to the ever-present difficulties associated with paying utility bills, the proposal of a one-stop utility bill payment system was intorduced at a meeting led by the chief advisor last month.

According to governmental press reports, the proposed scheme aims to secure a fair deal for consumers, to provide a more convenient utility bill payment system where all the utility bills can be paid simultaneously in an easy way.

While the anticipated scheme is still in the discussion phase, the change would definitely promise city dwellers some respite from the perpetual aggravation of waiting in long queues for hours to pay utility bills.

Ruksana Khanam, a resident of Farmgate, was waiting in a queue in the small passage of the local office of Pubali Bank in Farmgate to pay her monthly gas bill. She cast an anxious glare at the static queue in front as she was getting late to pick up her daughter from school.

It was another half an hour before Ruksana managed to reach the counter. As she stretched out the money and the bill statement, the cashier told Ruksana to come back an hour later as it was her lunchtime.

"She (the cashier) told me that she had already rinsed her hand for lunch, and asked me to come back an hour later," said Ruksana.

"After waiting for more than an hour in the queue, I was utterly annoyed with her (cashier's) behavior. However, the official who was sitting beside her agreed to accept my bill after I virtually pleaded with him," she added.

Just like Ruksana Khanam, citizens of the capital have been struggling to navigate this tortuous payment process for decades now.

"Only the sufferers know the pain involved in paying the electric bill on time in every month," said Habibur Rahman, a resident of Green Road.

Under the existing system, city dwellers have to pay the different utility service bills in different banks. The banks authorized to accept the utility bills are listed on the back of the bill statement issued by the service providers.

"While the private banks are quite efficient in handling the bill payment, it's the government banks where long queues tend to build up from early morning, thanks to the laid-back pace of the officials," said Ruksana Khanam.

"The fact that we have to go to different banks to pay the different utility bills is an annoyance itself. The long queues starting from early morning along with the slow process of the banks make the situation only worse," added Habibur Rahman.

Rahman went on to explain how each household tends to receive several bills printed on different papers for the different meters in the whole building. During the payment of the bills, the cashier has to go through all these bills and sign each of them to record the bill statements of the same household.

"It would have been more convenient for both the customers and bank officials if all the billing information for all meters were printed on a single piece of paper. This would reduce the pressure on the bank officials," he added.

According to city dwellers, the short duration and late distribution of the bills is another major problem in the utility bill payment system.

"By the time the bills are distributed, it significantly shortens the time remaining till the deadline of payment. If the duration for utility bills were extended for one monthfor example, issuing the bill on 1st date of a month while the due date remains till end of the month, it would ease the sufferings of the customers," said Badrul Hasan, from Uttara.

"If the due dates and duration of payment were incorporated among all the different utility bills, it would reduce much burden from customers as they would be able to pay all the monthly bills together on the same day, rather than paying each bill at a different time," he added.

Simplification of the existing utility bill payment system would be a welcome change for city dwellers.

"We, the sufferers know the suffering we have to go through during paying the utility bills every month. Simplification of the system would really be a great change for us," said Habibur Rahman, from Green Road.

This however, is not the first time initiatives to simplify the bill payment system have been taken by authorities. Dhaka Electric Supply Company Ltd (Desco) has been scheming to introduce an alternative hassle free bill payment system for Desco subscribers in collaboration with Grameen Phone.

However, the new system is yet to be instigated due to technical difficulties, said Desco officials.