Utility imposed electronic statements on 1.2 million customers without asking permission.
When a bank, credit card company, investment firm or utility wants to shift customers to paperless billing, they usually ask permission.
“This is a tremendous number of people opting out,” says Mark Toney, executive director of The Utility Reform Network, a consumer advocacy organization. “It’s an indication of PG&E being overzealous in switching people without their knowledge and without their consent.” PG&E claims that there has been no drop-off in timely payments with the paperless billing switch. That wasn’t my experience: As I was discovering what had happened, the company was sending me a debt-relief-plan offer because I had fallen behind on payments. Similarly, 20 customers who filed complaints with the California Public Utilities Commission about the consentless switch found themselves saddled with past-due bills of over $700, $892, over $1,000, $1,234, $1,675 and $2,000.
But the utility company started two years ago automatically switching 1.2 million more customers. The program swept up anyone who had previously provided the utility an email address and had paid their bill through the utility’s website or just through their bank bill-pay system. It’s from that group that 420,000 customers balked.
The PUC approved the PG&E automatic-switching program in 2017 after allowing Southern California Edison to do the same in 2015. The PUC staff analysis swallowed the PG&E propaganda that the change would “align with customer preferences.” Clearly, for 420,000 customers, it does not.
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