Settling a Complaint Against A Utility Filed with the Public Utility Commission

[iEngineer]

What is the name of your state? Pennsylvania

Hello everyone! Hope your new year is off to a good start so far. Looking for some advice regarding settling a complaint I filed with the Public Utility Commission (PUC) against a utility for service quality/reliability issues. Some of you may remember my post back from October. We did end up mediating it amongst ourselves without the PUC approved mediator. The PUC basically said we are here for either party if you need us if communication breaks down or if you run into an issue you can't solve. Perhaps fortunately, I've had good communication with the utility's third-party attorney representing them.

Unbeknownst to their third-party counsel, the utility actually sent a worker to my house during an outage (electric) and I provided a very detailed description of the issue, including every street that I was aware of that had the same issue. This worker later returned & told me the identified a possible problem, but it will take some time to resolve. About a week later, my local town posted an update on social media claiming that the utility has temporarily stabilized the issue & are working on a long-term fix. I shared this with their third-party counsel, who said they would get a status update for me regarding the fix.

My question becomes: What happens now? If they report the issue as fixed, do I just withdraw my complaint? The expressed goal of mediation per the PUC is "a full resolution, including withdraw of Complaint." My main concern is making sure the issue is permanently fixed, so it does not re-occur. I have no issues on granting a reasonable amount of time necessary for the repair. I'd just like to see that this will be followed through on.

I suppose what I want is more of a settlement rather than a complete withdraw so that there would be an agreement in place where the utility agrees to complete the repair. Is this a more solid choice for me to request? What should I ask for? I'd obviously like to retain the right to re-file if the issue were to occur again, or to enforce the agreement.

 

[adjusterjack]

Here's your previous thread:

(1) Is Mediation Appropriate for an issue before the Public Utility Commission | Forum.FreeAdvice.com

Are you saying that they are refusing to do the repair until you withdraw your complaint or agree to withdraw it?

 

[quincy]

What is the name of your state? Pennsylvania

Hello everyone! Hope your new year is off to a good start so far. Looking for some advice regarding settling a complaint I filed with the Public Utility Commission (PUC) against a utility for service quality/reliability issues. Some of you may remember my post back from October. We did end up mediating it amongst ourselves without the PUC approved mediator. The PUC basically said we are here for either party if you need us if communication breaks down or if you run into an issue you can't solve. Perhaps fortunately, I've had good communication with the utility's third-party attorney representing them.

Unbeknownst to their third-party counsel, the utility actually sent a worker to my house during an outage (electric) and I provided a very detailed description of the issue, including every street that I was aware of that had the same issue. This worker later returned & told me the identified a possible problem, but it will take some time to resolve. About a week later, my local town posted an update on social media claiming that the utility has temporarily stabilized the issue & are working on a long-term fix. I shared this with their third-party counsel, who said they would get a status update for me regarding the fix.

My question becomes: What happens now? If they report the issue as fixed, do I just withdraw my complaint? The expressed goal of mediation per the PUC is "a full resolution, including withdraw of Complaint." My main concern is making sure the issue is permanently fixed, so it does not re-occur. I have no issues on granting a reasonable amount of time necessary for the repair. I'd just like to see that this will be followed through on.

I suppose what I want is more of a settlement rather than a complete withdraw so that there would be an agreement in place where the utility agrees to complete the repair. Is this a more solid choice for me to request? What should I ask for? I'd obviously like to retain the right to re-file if the issue were to occur again, or to enforce the agreement.

If the utility has only “temporarily stabilized the issue & are working on a long-term fix,” the issue has not been fixed.

 

[iEngineer]

No, I’m still waiting to hear back from their attorney on the status of the issue. It does appear to be stable, so the townships update seems legit.

I just want to be prepared for when I get the call from their attorney. I don’t like the paperwork from the PUC saying the goal is a withdraw or the complaint. Personally, I feel that anything would be a settlement but I suppose this is a quirk of administrative complaints.

 

[quincy]

No, I’m still waiting to hear back from their attorney on the status of the issue. It does appear to be stable, so the townships update seems legit.

I just want to be prepared for when I get the call from their attorney. I don’t like the paperwork from the PUC saying the goal is a withdraw or the complaint. Personally, I feel that anything would be a settlement but I suppose this is a quirk of administrative complaints.

You probably should discuss your options with the mediator. If you are not comfortable withdrawing the complaint until there is a permanent fix to the problem, don’t withdraw the complaint. Or withdraw it and file a new complaint if the temporary fix fails.

 

[adjusterjack]

Seems to me if the problem is fixed, the complaint would be closed with no further action on complainant's part.

 

[iEngineer]

Thanks. It’ll obviously largely depend on their response to the question on if it’s fixed permanently/temporarily. I’ll keep pushing to just continue the matter if they need more time. I guess it depends on how much time they may need too.

As long as I’m not giving up my ability to re-file I’m comfortable as well. Though I did enjoy a little bit catching them in an outright lie with their initial answer (they outright denied there being issues & claimed the smart meter proved it…on discovery it magically changed to them agreeing to accept all of my reported outages…still never gave me my discovery request but all signs point to them fixing (or attempting to fix their lines at least).

 

[quincy]

Thanks. It’ll obviously largely depend on their response to the question on if it’s fixed permanently/temporarily. I’ll keep pushing to just continue the matter if they need more time. I guess it depends on how much time they may need too.

As long as I’m not giving up my ability to re-file I’m comfortable as well. Though I did enjoy a little bit catching them in an outright lie with their initial answer (they outright denied there being issues & claimed the smart meter proved it…on discovery it magically changed to them agreeing to accept all of my reported outages…still never gave me my discovery request but all signs point to them fixing (or attempting to fix their lines at least).

I hope the seemingly temporary fix results in a permanent fix to the outages. Good luck with whatever you decide to do with your complaint.

 

[adjusterjack]

As long as I’m not giving up my ability to re-file I’m comfortable as well.

You wouldn't be. Even if you withdrew the complaint, if the outages continue, there would be nothing stopping you from filing a new complaint on top of the old one.

 

[Zigner]

What is a "permanent fix" in your eyes?

 

[quincy]

What is a "permanent fix" in your eyes?

Good question.

I don’t know of any utility that will guarantee there will not be outages, or even how long those outages may last.

 

[LdiJ]

Good question.

I don’t know of any utility that will guarantee there will not be outages, or even how long those outages may last.

Yeah but there is a difference between outages once or twice a year due to storms or extraordinary periods of use, and outages that occur on a regular basis for no discernable reason. I think that the op's situation was/is the later.

 

[quincy]

Yeah but there is a difference between outages once or twice a year due to storms or extraordinary periods of use, and outages that occur on a regular basis for no discernable reason. I think that the op's situation was/is the later.

Yes. iEngineer said in October 2023 that the outages occurring over a 6 month period in 2023 were said to be “over 3x the annual average” interruption rate.

 

[iEngineer]

Thanks everyone for the advice & input thus far.

I’m not sure what the “permanent” fix will be. Their attorney was waiting to hear back from their engineering department on this. From what the lineman told me directly was that they found a faulty transformer that may be causing the issues & if that’s not it they have “it narrowed down to 10 utility poles”.

The outages were occurring multiple times a week, some days multiple times a day. They were always brief…but as you can imagine annoying. That was a big argument their attorney tried making in their defense. There’s a PA Supreme Court ruling that concluded utilities don’t have to provide perfect or even the best possible service. I never wanted that though instead I argued my service was unreasonable & un-adequate. Our State code says they have to provide “adequate” service that is “reasonably continuous”

Never had to go to a hearing to present anything though. The utility was denying any any issues at all. Claiming they could see any time the power went out & it never did. Then magically when I requested that they completely reversed their stance & said they agree with all times I recorded an outage. They even had a few I didn’t. What made me mad is it was like they didn’t perform any due diligence on their end when answering the complaint. Like all they wanted was to dismiss the complaint.

 

[quincy]

Thanks everyone for the advice & input thus far.

I’m not sure what the “permanent” fix will be. Their attorney was waiting to hear back from their engineering department on this. From what the lineman told me directly was that they found a faulty transformer that may be causing the issues & if that’s not it they have “it narrowed down to 10 utility poles”.

The outages were occurring multiple times a week, some days multiple times a day. They were always brief…but as you can imagine annoying. That was a big argument their attorney tried making in their defense. There’s a PA Supreme Court ruling that concluded utilities don’t have to provide perfect or even the best possible service. I never wanted that though instead I argued my service was unreasonable & un-adequate. Our State code says they have to provide “adequate” service that is “reasonably continuous”

Never had to go to a hearing to present anything though. The utility was denying any any issues at all. Claiming they could see any time the power went out & it never did. Then magically when I requested that they completely reversed their stance & said they agree with all times I recorded an outage. They even had a few I didn’t. What made me mad is it was like they didn’t perform any due diligence on their end when answering the complaint. Like all they wanted was to dismiss the complaint.

I guess you will have to wait to see what happens.