WHAT WHAT??? Electric bill almost $600.00

I just saw a post on twitter that showed someone received a bill for $1,000.00 dollars so you are not alone. Not sure what steps you should take besides going to their offices. They'd get nothing from me though!

You are not to pay the bill unless it is an actual reading of your meter.

It is possible that if you are using a generator, the needle of the meter may move. Many are having this issue where you are being charged for electricity you produced.

Rosello (the governor) has been saying that nobody will have to pay for electricity that was not delivered.
Do you have power now? If not, don't pay. What can they do, cut you off?

If you do have power, take a pic of the meter so you have proof of the reading.

Knowing our wonderful AEE you may have a hard time getting this sorted out....

I was just reading that a politician is saying that the AEE is sending out those bills in the hope that people do not challenge them and pays or if they do challenge it that they end up giving up after all the long lines and end up paying. According to him this is so they can use the money to pay the bills from Whitefish which is around 80 millions.

True or not? I don't know.

ReyP wrote:

True or not? I don't know.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if it were true.

It sure looks like PR is running out of money on all sides to pay for restoring the power and other efforts to get the island up and running again. If there's no help coming from DC we're on our way down the drain....

I called AEE regarding my electric hook up, which has not been done, was on hold for 3 hrs.  Finally  spoke with a rep, he assured me the work order would be completed promptly.  To date - no action on my electric hookup.

Sitka, I'd almost say: of course not.

Thing is, they don't give a Sh!t. We have reported problems, even got a ticket number and nothing has been done for more than two years. It almost looks like reporting and complaining only makes things worse.
Unless you know somebody who knows somebody who's in a management position within AEE there's no way to get things done fast (or at all).

Oh, not being a local is not helpful either. Locals have a better chance to be heard - I don't even bother anymore getting in touch with utilities etc. My (PR) wife gets more done.

AEE is so mismanaged that all these allegations do not surprise me.  I actually have a family member that works for AEE and I wasn't able to get a work order done.  We put in th request back in April 2017 via the family member.  Put in another request in July and a finally a complaint in August.  The rep looking into it said that for some reason the work order was marked as completed so they gave me a new ticket number.  I was so p.o. I took to Twitter to complain.   I was surprised that they responded immediately and told me they would look into it.  Well, now that hurricane Irma and Maria devastated the island, I have given up hope of that work order ever happening.  I also do not live there.  So even with a family member on the inside, the AEE is corrupt, incompetent and third world at best.

AEE needs privatization and COMPETITION. I am seriously considering building my house with solar and propane generator from day 1. Also some huge tanks for water reserves probably burried and run by pumps from the electricity I produce. It may cost a lot but I dont want the issues people are running into these days.

Best way to go!!

Good plan, Rey!
Whenever I have some money to invest it will go  into solar panels.
But tormenteras are on top of list. The plywood panels did their job but when I saw one of the neighbors installing his metal storm panels without any effort within a couple of hours I was sold. I also need another water tank for on the roof to replace the two small ones that were blown off. Hopefully the next big storm won't be here in the next four or preferably more years.

Hopefully the next storm wont come for the next 40-60 years

A little off topic but did make me laugh......

Pennsylvania woman gets $284bn electricity bill

An electricity bill for more than $284bn (£212bn) left a woman in the US state of Pennsylvania stunned... until she found out the amount was wrong.

Mary Horomanski from Erie said the latest bill showed that she had to pay the entire amount by November 2018.

"My eyes just about popped out of my head," she told the Erie Times-News. "We had put up Christmas lights and I wondered if we had put them up wrong."

The electricity provider later said the actual amount was $284.46.

A company's spokesman said it did not know how the error had occurred, stating that Ms Horomanski had to pay $284,460,000,000 with a first payment of $28,176 due later in December.

"I can't recall ever seeing a bill for billions of dollars," Mark Durbin told the Erie Times-News.

"We appreciate the customer's willingness to reach out to us about the mistake."

My bill for 9/28 to 10/28 was 584.... storm was 9/20 and power intermittently restored over the last few weeks. I received a cut off notice and advice to just pay it and fight later as the reconnect charges would be astronomical.....I'm heading home in a few weeks and will get my gladiator gear ready for getting all the repairs done, the insurance settled, the water and electric bills straightened out. Sadly mistaken if they think this Texan turned Rican will go quietly into the dark .

My advice would be not to pay but take the bill and go the "your" AEE office. Bring a local friend or relative if your Spanish isn't good enough to talk about this. They will (have to) adjust the bill to a reasonable amount.
I've been there and done that a couple of years ago when my meter was getting crazy (it was defective)  and I suddenly got an invoice for a couple of thousand dollars.

I know what you mean! After three months, mine was almost $74!

All I could suggest is to take pictures of your meter daily regardless of having or no power, that way you can show them the meter progression and determine if they are reading your meter incorrectly. This is specially important if one of the pictures is for the day that they supposedly read your meter.

Unless you have one of them "modern" electronic meters that they installed here. No power -> no display. I wonder what that one will show when they reconnect us after 4 months or more... (nope, no power yet...)

If you feed the whole house, it may show all the KWH produced by the generator and AEE will want a piece of the action.

Not if you install a transfer switch the way it should be done.

This may interest the group since it deals with AEE, however there are some political points in there, there is no unbiased reporting anywhere.
https://theintercept.com/2018/01/10/pue … ane-maria/

Interesting article. Whatever political agenda may be behind this, it's not helping the people of PR..

Related to this is what the team leader of the US linemen crew that started working on the power lines in my neck of the woods told me. He and a crew of 4 men were making a map of the grid in the area so they knew how lines should be installed and which parts they would need. He complained that they had to do this and could not get the maps from PREPA. When they requested the needed info it was simply refused.
Also PREPA didn't give them access to a substation when they needed to do something there. This caused another delay in their work.

Again, whatever is behind this, the lack of cooperation is definitely not helping the people.

I posted this on FB, yesterday. I'm actually surprised how few have responded to my post. We are being screwed, by the very people who are supposed to be helping us! IMHO, PREPA should be disbanded. I've spoken to many linemen who said they'd love to move here, with their families, and work in PR. Yet another Federal agency, needed to curb corruption. "Puerto Rico does it better!"

We do it better, we do corruption great.

I know someone who has their monthly electric bill taken directly out of their bank account every month...

Are you sitting down...

They took out over $16,000 in December and $9,000 in January...

Yeah, the guy is pretty well off to have this amount sitting in his account..

Wow.. and direct debit is suppose to make everything easy... No worries..

LOL... So much for that...

Yes, he did have a very large generator hooked up in his house for this time period...

He was going to the electric office yesterday to try and get it straightened out..

I let you know what happened..

Wow!

JohnnyNight wrote:

I know someone who has their monthly electric bill taken directly out of their bank account every month...

Are you sitting down...

They took out over $16,000 in December and $9,000 in January...

Yeah, the guy is pretty well off to have this amount sitting in his account..

Wow.. and direct debit is suppose to make everything easy... No worries..

LOL... So much for that...

Yes, he did have a very large generator hooked up in his house for this time period...

He was going to the electric office yesterday to try and get it straightened out..

I let you know what happened..

Convenience bite you in the butt. I pay by my bank never let companies take the money out. If they get hacked who knows what will happen.

Gary wrote:

Unless you have one of them "modern" electronic meters that they installed here. No power -> no display. I wonder what that one will show when they reconnect us after 4 months or more... (nope, no power yet...)

got a bill already? 😉

Marion-Olga wrote:

got a bill already? 😉

No power, no bill.. 

We just recently had power restored.  Got photos of meter reading for my records just in case.