PUC seeking public comment linked to PPL billing debacle settlement

• By Brian Myszkowski/LehighValleyNews.com

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission is seeking public comment from PPL customers concerning a proposed settlement linked to billing issues in 2023, the organization announced Thursday.

The settlement, proposed by the PUC’s Independent Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement alongside PPL, includes a $1 million civil penalty and PPL’s agreement to absorb over $16 million in related costs.

Those related costs include about $2.3 million in voluntarily waived late fees, about $7.8 million of additional bad debt expense arising out of the voluntary service termination moratorium, forgoing collection of approximately $1.7 million from customers who were underbilled in the estimation true-up process, an additional approximately $3.7 million of unplanned costs in engaging external vendors, and about $700,000 of unbudgeted employee overtime expenses.

According to a release from the PUC, the organization decided to publish the proposed settlement in the Pennsylvania Bulletin in a 5-0 vote. The publication marks the beginning of a 25-day public comment period linked to the settlement.

Complete instructions for submitting commentary will be released once the proposed settlement is published, the PUC noted.

The commission stated they would carefully review all comments received before issuing a final decision on the case.

The decision comes in the wake of an investigation launched by the PUC in early 2023 concerning billing issues impacting PPL customers. Public response to the PUC noted a large number of complaints about unusually high or low estimated bills, missing monthly bills, and a lack of adequate customer service support which led to consumers being unable to reach the PPL Call Center to discuss concerns.

The matter was then referred to the Bureau of Investigation & Enforcement, which enforces the PUC’s regulations and maintains the authority to bring enforcement actions before the commission.

Previously, the PUC stated billing issues had started in December 2022, when PPL found its customer meter data was not transferred from the utility’s meter data management software to its customer service system.

“The inability to transfer actual meter data backed up normal customer billing operations and resulted in sending estimated December 2022 bills,” the PUC said. “Later, human error caused additional incorrect bills to be issued, while some customers received no bills, and issues with bill estimation resulted in wildly inaccurate bills.”

The PUC stated more than 48,000 PPL accounts received no bills during one or more months between Dec. 2022 and April 2023; more than 91,000 unique PPL accounts received no bills during that same time period; nearly 795,000 estimated bills were issued by PPL from Dec. 2022 to Jan. 2023, and 65,000 more were issued between February and May; 67% of bills analyzed by PPL – 261,104 customers — had an estimate differing from the customers’ actual usage of 10% or greater, with a third of them differing by more than 25%, and nearly 48,000 bills were based on an estimate that differed from actual usage by more than 50%; and 41% of calls to PPL from January to April were abandoned without customers being able to reach a representative, and those who did faced “extremely long wait times.”

In addition, the PUC said more than 82,000 estimated bills were affected by missing or inaccurate supply charges, leading to a process in which PPL canceled the initial estimated bills and rebilled accounts to correct the errors, creating customer confusion and complications that took months to address.