ENERGY: State’s utilities cutting power to more poor families, regulator reports

SDG&E bucks trend, extending assistance on bills under an assistance program, were then walloped with high reconnection fees in addition to costs for spoiled food, dislocation and other effects of losing power, said the report by the Division of Ratepayer Advocates, which is part of the California Public Utilities Commission.

But San Diego Gas & Electric Co. has bucked the trend, avoiding shut-offs and enrolling more people in their assistance programs through aggressive outreach.

Statewide, 6.1 percent of California’s electricity users had their power turned off between September 2008 and August, or 653,242 of the state’s residential customers, up 1 percentage point from the previous 12 months.

And the problem is especially acute among poor families, 212,768 of whom, or 8.44 percent, have been cut off, up 2 percentage points. Southern California Edison, which covers a vast area that includes Riverside County, shut off power to 10.44 percent of its low-income customers, up 2 points.

But SDG&E managed to keep the lights on for most of its customers, even the ones with the lowest income. Between September 2008 and August, SDG&E shut off power to 4.35 percent of its low-income users, or 239,931 households, up less than a percentage point, despite seeing a 5.8 percent increase in the number of low-income customers.

SDG&E has been aggressive in trying to locate low-income customers and enroll them in assistance programs. April Bolduc, spokeswoman for the utility, said in an e-mail that the company has added $1.3 million to a charitable fund administered by the United Way, increased enrollment in programs for low-income customers by 7,000 by using an automated dialing system to call qualified customers, and taken advantage of online networking tools such as Twitter.

“We’d like to see more of the utilities follow best practices like what they do down there,” said Setideh Khosrowjah, a policy adviser within the division, referring to SDG&E.

Longtime SDG&E critic Michael Shames, executive director of the Utility Consumers Action Network, said he met with utility executives in January to discuss the possibility of too many disconnections because of the economic recession.

“They said they’d track the disconnection rate. If it went higher than the historical rate, they’d take steps,” he said.

Customers who are cut off quickly realize the challenges of life without power, the report said. Roughly 80 percent of customers scrounge up the money to have their electricity turned back on within a few days, the report said. It suggests that if customers were aware of assistance programs before their cutoff, they would use them.

“When faced with the loss of utility service, most disconnected customers find the means to pay their bill, plus reconnection fees and deposits to re–establish credit,” the report said.

The report estimates the costs of reconnection at $200, plus the cost of spoiled food and dislocation while the power is out. Bolduc said SDG&E charges just $15.

Authors of the report also issued a warning about potential abuse of the new computerized smart meters that the utilities are rolling out.

Khosrowjah said the disconnection rate of Pacific Gas & Electric Co. nearly doubled because it was able to switch off power remotely, without sending a field crew to the house. She speculated that as the companies install more of these meters, the problem could get worse.

“Some of these numbers are lower than they should be because (the utilities) don’t have the staff to do the shutoff,” Khosrowjah said. “If they can just flip a switch, these numbers are going to go a lot higher.”

Shames said smart meters should help consumers as well as utilities.

“The reconnection fees are extraordinarily high, but if a remote shutoff is done, they don’t have to send a truck out there to turn it back on,” Shames said. “The utility has an obligation to reduce the reconnection fees, because they don’t have the expenses.”

Bolduc said SDG&E plans to reduce connection fees to $5.

Call staff writer Eric Wolff at 760-740-5412.