Posted on 03/29/2022 6:37:07 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Sticker shock is arriving in the mail with the RGE bill. Tuesday we talked with two small business owners who say they went months without getting an RGE bill. And then this week the bill arrived, dwarfing what they normally pay in a month.
RGE says missing meter readings are the root cause, but the customers I talked to showed their meters were read and they still weren't billed since Christmas until the big one arrived.
"They didn't bill me for two months on at least two of my business locations," pizza shop owner Peter Jones said.
But this week it came. Jones' RGE bill is $6,168 dollars. He normally pays $1,600 a month at his pizza shops in the city. He says RGE told him it was a problem in its billing department.
"There's a lot of bills that come and go in a small business and I didn't think too much about it and didn't look too hard at it until I got that $6,000 invoice," Jones said.
"The RGE bill might be here. Let's go see if it's here," Kim Colasurdo said as she walked into her salon in Gates. She says she wasn't billed since December either. But today she saw her online bill. It says $2,604 dollars, three times what she normally pays.
After months of no bills, pizza shop owner gets $6,168 RG&E bill "But definitely just seeing the amount made me think -- what am I going to do?" she said.
When Colasurdo called RGE, she thought it might just be her bad luck.
Colasurdo: "They said it was thousands of people."
Brean: "Thousands of people? They said it could be thousands of people?" Colasurdo: "Yeah."
RGE says missing meter reads are the root cause for most billing delays and can be attributed to no access to the meter, inclement weather, unsafe conditions, and since 2020, pandemic-related reasons.
Industrial, large commercial and small commercial accounts fall into a category that requires an actual read or a manually entered read for billing. RG&E's E-bill program allows customers to view their bills online, but a meter read is still required to produce the bill to be viewed.
Payment arrangements are available to customers who receive an invoice that includes more than one billing period.
Colasurdo says RGE has a record of someone coming out to read her meters and meter readings in December, January, February, and March are actually listed on Jones' bill.
"I'm sure I'm going to be okay. My real concern is for the residents of the city of Rochester. If they did it to me, they probably did it to a lot more people than just me," Jones said.
Jones is signed up for auto-billing and auto-pay and this problem still happened to him.
The business owners not getting billed more money. The total represents the total of two to three months of service.
But when that bill came, it was a shock.
Oh, please! Did Mr. Jones and Ms. Colasurdo REALLY think they were getting free power and gas for those months?
the power company should of said.. your welcome! we could of charged you interest! are you not glad you got to keep your money for a few extra months?
Now, pay what you owe us!
They’re complaining about getting under billed...Some people are just plain a****.
When we bought our house, it came with a stupid Tesla solar panel lease. Tesla bought out Solar City years ago, and the billing is still poorly handled. I wasn’t getting billed, I called them, they told me to wait, and then I got the big bill six months later. I wasn’t surprised, and paid right away, but the tone of the bill was that if I didn’t jump on this there was something wrong with me, and not a hint that they are not running properly yet. Tesla treats solar homes like a tolerated but unloved ginger step-child.
I can find no option to buy out the lease.
You can charge interest if you forget to send a bill/invoice?
I very much doubt there is an exemption for a screw-up by the power and gas company.
An exemption from paying, or they get to charge interest?
Yet another reason not one part of my solar system is from Tesla.
I doubt that the power company would suspend interest charges because they failed to provide a bill.
It’s not like rent that you pay the same amount every month. It’s interesting if they can require you to read their mind.
My county can’t find people to walk neighborhoods to read water meters.
They have sent me an “estimated” bill for the last several months.
I have no idea if they are right...
No.
My electric bill for my restaurant is deducted automatically but if for some reason it wasn’t. I would call and find out what is up. I think these people need bookkeepers . How would they be blindsided by this? These are not serious business people.
Yeah, “should of” and “could of”.
Call me cynical if you will.
I would go over the bills to make sure I was charged the correct rate for each month and not the highest rate of the 3 month period.
They could upgrade to radio-read meters. Hell, even backwards Manassas Park, VA has had them for close to 20 years.
I do not know where you live but I would not want to be attached to anything like that. I looked up Tesla’s lease. It is too strict for me.
Is there anyway you can have the solar panels removed and end the Tesla lease that way. Just say you no longer want solar.
Honestly I am not a solar person of course I do not live in a sunny state so I see this roof lease deal a thorn on your side.
You could also sell and get out of that property. If you hate it get out.
I would rather have my house and put panels up myself and own them and not have a Lease with a solar company. I never heard of it until you wrote.
Mine has people who just drive their car by. It’s all done electronically. They do not even need to leave the car.
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