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Puget Sound Energy has a similar problem. They switched to a new (outsourced) billing system recently that was supposed to "dramatically improve" billing state
by pudquick 13y ago
Puget Sound Energy has a similar problem.
They switched to a new (outsourced) billing system recently that was supposed to "dramatically improve" billing statements.
At our house, we had two accounts for PSE - one for the house power and a separate account number for a streetlight-like fixture on our property. The reason for the two account numbers was that they were billed differently: house power as normal, streetlight at a fixed rate paid once every other month.
To add to the complexity, we were enrolled in an estimated payments plan. Our costs stayed they same, month to month, with adjustments twice a year to update our average payment amount up/down.
Before the new billing system, we received bills once a month - with the amount fluctuating every other month by the cost of the outdoor light.
Under the new system, we had the "estimated payments" check marked, the reps could see it in the system, they claimed we were enrolled - but our bills that arrived acted as though we weren't in that payment plan.
They couldn't explain it. We were told "Oh, well, it's probably due to the cutover to the new system. Next month's bill should be normal." But it wasn't.
"Oh, it's probably just hiccups - I just changed something here so next month will work for you." Nope.
"It shows you're enrolled. Maybe it's in your spam email?" We get the emails fine. It's the wrong damned payment plan.
Our friends and family didn't have these problems. I figured it was because their idiotic new system couldn't handle monthly estimates plus a bimonthly secondary meter.
So we said "to heck with this" and dropped the outdoor light (installed our own floodlights instead).
MAGICALLY estimated payment bills started working for our account.
Funny that.
Kudos on going farther the Hard Way.
- chris_wot 13y agoWhy didn't you ask to speak to a manager?
- pudquick 13y agoOh we did. Several. The one who said "Oh, it's probably just hiccups - I just changed something here so next month will work for you." was one of them. Pretty sure he just "turned it off and on again", praying the problem would go away or that I'd give up. And in a way - I did. At a loss to them. What I pay in additional metered power for the floodlights is peanuts compared to what we were being charged every other month. Honestly I couldn't be happier with the final result. But that's also why I complimented the author of the original content who stuck to it long enough to (possibly) get the broken system fixed.