Electric Service Being Cut Off To 46,000 In Bangor, Maine
- Thread starter Hansa44
- Start date
Copter Doctor
Inactive
I'm reminded of the time that Catherine, one of Shannon 's friends when she was little, told me that she wanted to be President one day.
Both of her parents, liberal democrats, were standing there with us, and I asked Catherine, "If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?"
Catherine replied, "I would give houses to all the homeless people."
"Wow! What a worthy goal you have there, Catherine", I told her. "You don't have to wait until you're President to do that, you can come over to my house and clean up all the dog poop in the back yard and I will pay you $5. Then we can go over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $5 to use for a new house."
Catherine (who was about 4) thought that over for a second, while her mom looked at me seething, and Catherine replied, "Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and clean up the dog poop and you can pay him the $5 dollars."
(Welcome to the Republican Party ) Well, maybe not any more! Their all SPENDOCRATS!
Both of her parents, liberal democrats, were standing there with us, and I asked Catherine, "If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?"
Catherine replied, "I would give houses to all the homeless people."
"Wow! What a worthy goal you have there, Catherine", I told her. "You don't have to wait until you're President to do that, you can come over to my house and clean up all the dog poop in the back yard and I will pay you $5. Then we can go over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $5 to use for a new house."
Catherine (who was about 4) thought that over for a second, while her mom looked at me seething, and Catherine replied, "Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and clean up the dog poop and you can pay him the $5 dollars."
(Welcome to the Republican Party ) Well, maybe not any more! Their all SPENDOCRATS!
night driver
ESFP adrift in INTJ sea
Copter yer seditious!!!!
And HILARIOUS!!!!
And HILARIOUS!!!!
CeeBee
Inactive
fair use for discussion purposes...
Bangor Hydro trying to collect on past-due bills
By Nok-Noi Ricker
Thursday, May 08, 2008 - Bangor Daily News
BANGOR, Maine - Knowing their electricity wouldn’t be cut off in the winter, local residents Lana and Jon Courtright chose to buy food and gasoline instead of paying their electric bill.
The bill was placed on the back burner and now "we’re just behind," Lana Courtright said on Wednesday, adding the couple received a disconnection notice from Bangor Hydro-Electric Co. a couple of days ago for the $400 past due bill.
"What are you going to do," she said. "You need those two [gas and groceries] to pay the other one."
The disconnection notice is just one of approximately 46,000 the electric company has issued this year to its 118,000 customers, Kim Wadleigh, senior director of customer operations at Bangor Hydro, said Wednesday.
The company has unpaid customer bills totaling $3.6 million. Most of the disconnection notices were sent to residential purchasers, she said.
More customers have been issued past-due notices this year and the average past-due amount also is more than last year, Wadleigh said.
"The average balance owed per disconnect order for 2008 is $393, as compared to last year which was $352," she said.
She added later, "We’ve been looking at this since 2005 and there is an upward trend."
Central Maine Power, which has 600,000 residential and business customers in Maine, declined to provide current disconnect notice figures, but in 2007 disconnected 18,553 customers for unpaid bills, according to Maine Public Utilities Commission figures.
The PUC is the agency that protects residents from disconnection in the cold winter months, CMP spokeswoman Gail Rice said Wednesday.
"The PUC rules, known as the winter disconnect rule, basically state that between Nov. 15 and April 15 residential disconnections need PUC approval," she said. "This applies to all utilities" not just electric companies.
"Generally, you don’t see disconnections between those months," Rice said.
Rice added that if customers make an effort to make payments, they generally will not be disconnected.
"Customers who do get a disconnection notice can call us," she said. "We can work together [and] we are very successful in negotiating with customers to avoid disconnection."
The disconnection notices give customers one month to pay the bill or make payment arraignments.
The key to keeping electricity connected is not avoiding the bill, Wadleigh said.
"If they can just pay something" it shows effort, she said. "We understand it’s the cost of living in Maine. You only have so much money going around and you have to have heat, [so] we sometimes have to go on the back burner during the winter."
Jon Courtright added that this year’s jump in gasoline prices has really put his family in a pinch.
"We’re dishing out $40 [a week] for gas," he said. "Times that by four and that’s the electric bill right there."
Bangor Hydro trying to collect on past-due bills
By Nok-Noi Ricker
Thursday, May 08, 2008 - Bangor Daily News
BANGOR, Maine - Knowing their electricity wouldn’t be cut off in the winter, local residents Lana and Jon Courtright chose to buy food and gasoline instead of paying their electric bill.
The bill was placed on the back burner and now "we’re just behind," Lana Courtright said on Wednesday, adding the couple received a disconnection notice from Bangor Hydro-Electric Co. a couple of days ago for the $400 past due bill.
"What are you going to do," she said. "You need those two [gas and groceries] to pay the other one."
The disconnection notice is just one of approximately 46,000 the electric company has issued this year to its 118,000 customers, Kim Wadleigh, senior director of customer operations at Bangor Hydro, said Wednesday.
The company has unpaid customer bills totaling $3.6 million. Most of the disconnection notices were sent to residential purchasers, she said.
More customers have been issued past-due notices this year and the average past-due amount also is more than last year, Wadleigh said.
"The average balance owed per disconnect order for 2008 is $393, as compared to last year which was $352," she said.
She added later, "We’ve been looking at this since 2005 and there is an upward trend."
Central Maine Power, which has 600,000 residential and business customers in Maine, declined to provide current disconnect notice figures, but in 2007 disconnected 18,553 customers for unpaid bills, according to Maine Public Utilities Commission figures.
The PUC is the agency that protects residents from disconnection in the cold winter months, CMP spokeswoman Gail Rice said Wednesday.
"The PUC rules, known as the winter disconnect rule, basically state that between Nov. 15 and April 15 residential disconnections need PUC approval," she said. "This applies to all utilities" not just electric companies.
"Generally, you don’t see disconnections between those months," Rice said.
Rice added that if customers make an effort to make payments, they generally will not be disconnected.
"Customers who do get a disconnection notice can call us," she said. "We can work together [and] we are very successful in negotiating with customers to avoid disconnection."
The disconnection notices give customers one month to pay the bill or make payment arraignments.
The key to keeping electricity connected is not avoiding the bill, Wadleigh said.
"If they can just pay something" it shows effort, she said. "We understand it’s the cost of living in Maine. You only have so much money going around and you have to have heat, [so] we sometimes have to go on the back burner during the winter."
Jon Courtright added that this year’s jump in gasoline prices has really put his family in a pinch.
"We’re dishing out $40 [a week] for gas," he said. "Times that by four and that’s the electric bill right there."
Loretta Van Riet
Trying to hang out with the cool kids.
Make sure you read the comments underneath the article too.
I read the comments. They certainly attacked that woman for having an internet connection. They assumed she has Cable, etc. The disabled need a gateway to the outside world. She probably doesn't have a cell phone, or automobile. jmho
Loretta V.
The last time I talked to someone in Banger utilities they were loosing half a million a year in non-collectables. The longer you let a persons electric stay on, the larger this number gets. More and more consumer protection laws make it harder to get someone off for nonpayment. Some states like KY are called 10-10 states. That means 10 dollars behind and 10 days late you can be shut off. Utility companies can sell cheaper in these states because they don’t have the big loss in non-collectables. The laws that were designed to protect electric consumers, actually cause them to pay more.
Freeholder
This too shall pass.
The company has 118,000 customers and is having to shut 46,000 of them off?!? That seems like a pretty high percentage! (Maybe some of them will get paid up before they get shut off, but still....) I wonder how long the electric companies are going to be able to stay in business, at this rate? We seriously need to be prepped for living without the electric grid -- it wouldn't take an EMP blast to shut it off.
Kathleen
Kathleen
momof23goats
Deceased
good question Kathleen, seems like they are shutting off half of their customers. now if they repeat that for a couple of months, they will be left with no customers.
this is bad. I know my mothers bill, my son's bill and one of my neighbors, as well, as mine was 475 this month. and not one of us use it for anything but lights, and a fridge, and I have freezer. and they say it is going up another 20 percent. I told dh 2 years ago to build an ice house.
Chartreuse
Yellow Solar Sun
Make sure you read the comments underneath the article too.
Wow. I think you're going to see that more and more as a coping mechanism - the reality is too horrible so people's first reaction is to just find some excuse to write it off as being all a person's own fault. Usually this is done without any knowledge of the person's actual circumstances.
Those comments don't exactly make for an inspiring picture of humanity.
It used to be that utilities were regulated. During that period, one pretty much knew what one's bill would be, and could afford it. Now that utilities are "commodities" and traded like stocks and bonds (should be illegal IMO), this issue is simply going to continue, and increase. At some point, people are going to stary dying IN THIS COUNTRY (supposedly the best place on Earth to live) due to this "predatory capitalism" that has been fostered by laissez-faire government. And I don't want to hear any bullsh*t about how "socialist" I am. People dying because of predatory capitalism CANNOT be defended by ANY rational-thinking human being.
Jonas Parker
Hooligan
Wow! Must either be something in the water up there or the Yankees are really not very nice. They sure ripped the disabled woman who posted the first comment. She should "shake the dust (mud?) from her feet" and move south to Texas...
As I see it, the job of government is to protect the citizens against ALL enemies, "foreign and domestic." If that definition encompasses a situation like the OP (which I believe that it DOES), then the government needs to step in. The problem is that the gov't is so damned inept and corrupt these days that I don't see a viable solution coming from that quarter. But I sure wish that something could be done. because one day SOON we're all going to be in the same boat as the people in the OP that are getting cut off.
Predatory capitalism is NOT GOOD for anyone. Except the CEO(s) involved.
Predatory capitalism is NOT GOOD for anyone. Except the CEO(s) involved.
Turnpike Jim
Inactive
momof23goats
You are LYING again. The last time you tossed out numbers like that, people asked you for specifics, and you would not reply. Prove me wrong! Please!
Jim
Freeholder
This too shall pass.
I agree. Pure (predatory) capitalism is bad, and pure socialism is bad. There's got to be some kind of balance. The economy exists FOR the benefit of people, not people for the benefit of the economy.
Kathleen
I am sure there is a percentage that is already squeezing their pennies till they scream...but the rest should toughen up and make a phone call and make arrangements. Or get a second or third job. Or move. Or learn to live without electric. Or cut something else out of the budget.
I find it hard to blame the company for collecting agreed-upon debts.
I find it hard to blame the company for collecting agreed-upon debts.
So Nuthatch, if the electric company suddely said to you, "We're going to add a monthly charge of $500 a month to your bill from now on. No reason, we just want the money." That would be okay with you? I see that as extortion. Last time I checked, that was a crime.
Sorry but I believe her
It depends on what you pay per unit... Also some people forget to figure in that the computer, VCR, satellite box, clocks, cordless telephone, microwave, electric stove and quite a few other things draw power even when not in use.. They just look at things that are turned onGee, Dennis, I thought I read the article carefully and I missed that part about simply adding $500 to the bill. I might choose to cancel the service if it came to that. You can bet I would consider alternatives.
Seriously, you get a monthly bill....you see how much it is....you either figure you can afford it or you change things so you can....or you CALL THEM and make arrangements to pay something to keep it going.
I'm not saying electric isn't expensive or that the rates haven't increased incredibly. I am simply saying that if you want to be prudent or prepared, you might have taken note and made adjustments.
We have decreased our electric use by half in the past 12 months. Down to roughly an average of 800 kWh. And we still have satellite tv, computer, internet service(dial-up), central AC/heating, hot tub which uses electric to circulate(24/7 in the winter)/start the heater, etc.
Edited to add: I think they refer to the units of measure as kWh...Anyway, we went from over 1600 to last month---480.
Seriously, you get a monthly bill....you see how much it is....you either figure you can afford it or you change things so you can....or you CALL THEM and make arrangements to pay something to keep it going.
I'm not saying electric isn't expensive or that the rates haven't increased incredibly. I am simply saying that if you want to be prudent or prepared, you might have taken note and made adjustments.
We have decreased our electric use by half in the past 12 months. Down to roughly an average of 800 kWh. And we still have satellite tv, computer, internet service(dial-up), central AC/heating, hot tub which uses electric to circulate(24/7 in the winter)/start the heater, etc.
Edited to add: I think they refer to the units of measure as kWh...Anyway, we went from over 1600 to last month---480.
My point is that by trading energy like stocks, the same thing is happening that was done to housing by the "investment mania" that artifically drove home prices through the roof, and are now responsible for the mortgage crisis. Energy is NOT (well, SHOULD not) be a traded commodity, where speculators and manipulators make billions of $'s off the backs of people who are being taken advantage of. Remember Enron?Remember what that company did? THEY were the ones responsible for that huge spike in California utility bills a few years ago, fueled by artifical shortages beased on electric plant closures that they orchestrated. The entire thing was 100% a scam to bilk the public. THAT is the typical result to be expected from a deregulated vital infrastructure compoment. We are all essentially held hostage to the infrastructure providers, and they know it. And these days, they have absolutely no compunction against choking the last dime out of everyone, by hook or by CROOK. And the gov't, which USED to protect us via regulation, now sits back and lets this mess spiral out of control. As I said before, peolpe are going to start dying because they can no longer afford their vital infrastructure. Someone, SOMEWHERE, has to keep these companies from criminally extorting money from people.
Turnpike Jim
Inactive
Sorry Diamonds, then you are one of the gullible ones. I tire of people who toss out numbers just for the shock value. And people with good hearts believe. If Mom would provide the Kwh used, and the price per, I will gladly appologize. I have asked before, with the intent to try to help.
Trust, but Verify.
Words of wisdom.
Jim
You do have to try and weed out the smoke-blowers. Or at least know who they are.
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Walker10
Veteran Member
Actually there is really little reason to feel sorry for many of these folks. While there are some true hardship cases out there, most times you are dealing with scam artists.
I work for an electric utility and see this on an almost daily basis. Most of these people have the money to pay their bills, but they game the system by only making a minimum payment right before Winter when they know a utility is barred from cutting them off. They go the Winter paying no bill and then at this time of the year, when cuts can once again begin, they will make another minimum payment to prevent that.
People who are slated for being cut, have already been contacted three times with phone calls and letters asking them to pay, or to call the utility to make arrangements to pay a reduced amount.
Bear in mind that doing something like this is especially egregious because electric service is one of the few things that you can use FIRST and THEN pay for. Most things you pay for first before using.
I work for an electric utility and see this on an almost daily basis. Most of these people have the money to pay their bills, but they game the system by only making a minimum payment right before Winter when they know a utility is barred from cutting them off. They go the Winter paying no bill and then at this time of the year, when cuts can once again begin, they will make another minimum payment to prevent that.
People who are slated for being cut, have already been contacted three times with phone calls and letters asking them to pay, or to call the utility to make arrangements to pay a reduced amount.
Bear in mind that doing something like this is especially egregious because electric service is one of the few things that you can use FIRST and THEN pay for. Most things you pay for first before using.
Walker10
Veteran Member
Rats...I'm really too quick with the submit button.
Something you aren't told in this little fairy tale, is that about five minutes after the crew cuts the service, these folks will invariably be calling the utility to have the service restored. They will have 'magically' gotten the money to pay the bill. See this all the time. ALL THE TIME!
Also, there is the issue with the cost of sending a crew to cut service (usually runs about $75.00) only to have the people call in five minutes later. The crew wastes it's time doing things like this instead of more important things like restoring customers services...legitimate customers.
Something you aren't told in this little fairy tale, is that about five minutes after the crew cuts the service, these folks will invariably be calling the utility to have the service restored. They will have 'magically' gotten the money to pay the bill. See this all the time. ALL THE TIME!
Also, there is the issue with the cost of sending a crew to cut service (usually runs about $75.00) only to have the people call in five minutes later. The crew wastes it's time doing things like this instead of more important things like restoring customers services...legitimate customers.
Turnpike Jim
Inactive
Walker10
What are you trying to say man?
Jim
What are you trying to say man?
Jim
Walker10
Veteran Member
For those of you interested in the state of the US power grid, here's an excellent article, a definite read that shows the problems that have cropped up as a result of deregulation.
I tried to copy it over from The Oil Drum but for some reason it won't let me.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3934#more
I tried to copy it over from The Oil Drum but for some reason it won't let me.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3934#more
Walker10
Veteran Member
Turnpike Jim
Inactive
Glad your OK, was worried there for a minute.
Jim
Jim
You have to be careful with the 46,000 out of 118,000 number and NOT jump to conclusions about that being half their customers.
It MAY be but I doubt it.
More than likely those represent multiple notices to the same address.
There have also probably been many notices that were sent...people caught up, got behind and were sent subsequent notices...may have in fact been disconnected, reconnected and disconnected again.
The PUC likely requires them to report EVERY notice sent regardless of how many were sent to the same address.
So we really do not have enough information to declare that they are cutting off almost half their customers...but it is likely a significant percentage regardless.
Kris
It MAY be but I doubt it.
More than likely those represent multiple notices to the same address.
There have also probably been many notices that were sent...people caught up, got behind and were sent subsequent notices...may have in fact been disconnected, reconnected and disconnected again.
The PUC likely requires them to report EVERY notice sent regardless of how many were sent to the same address.
So we really do not have enough information to declare that they are cutting off almost half their customers...but it is likely a significant percentage regardless.
Kris
The implication here, of course, is that employers are eager to hire homeless people, and that everyone who is unemployed is a lazy bum. I would suggest that's not usually the case.
Nor do they wish to employ disabled people who may not be able stand long and need to be hospitalized often, nor people dying of cancer, nor those who have a mental illness not well controlled by meds, nor people largely paralyzed or who have extensive brain damage from a car accident.
For whatever reason, most companies prefer to hire healthy, sane, clean individuals, and they usually do have the choice.
And this happens most on properties that require a pole truck to turn the electric off and then back on. Expensive!There are some new technology electric meters that can be unlocked to allow only a specific amount of electricity to flow. The idea is you can install them on properties that have a history of hard to collect bills, and then you can make the customer pre pay for electric. I have never seen them in use but it wouldn’t surprise me if eventually a lot of utility companies start making you pay in advance.
Walker10
Veteran Member
There are some new technology electric meters that can be unlocked to allow only a specific amount of electricity to flow. The idea is you can install them on properties that have a history of hard to collect bills, and then you can make the customer pre pay for electric. I have never seen them in use but it wouldn’t surprise me if eventually a lot of utility companies start making you pay in advance.
The problem with the Automated Meter Reading (AMR) meters or any others, is that the people remove the meters and put jumpers in to continue their service. That's why we frequently have to send a crew to cut service at the pole, and then send a crew to reconnect the next day after payment is received.
This story doesn't give a true picture of the situation as it actually exists and IMO is written in such a way as to elicit sympathy where it frequently isn't deserved.
annieosage
Veteran Member
Hmmm. Our electric bills have been right around $114 all winter (per month). Now that the heat is on us- low 100's by the weekend, that will triple or quadruple. I am already stressing over how we will manage this summer and our summer lasts thru Halloween. When it gets to 110+ for days on end and some even 120+ you simply cannot go without air.
My wages don't change but gas, food, electric, everything is going up up up. We have to cut somewhere....
And we live a simple life. No extras other than the internet and I ain't about to give this up. Not yet anyway. Came close this week but for a miracle.
My wages don't change but gas, food, electric, everything is going up up up. We have to cut somewhere....
And we live a simple life. No extras other than the internet and I ain't about to give this up. Not yet anyway. Came close this week but for a miracle.