You're not alone! Over the years, many of us have had bad experiences with RG&E, from minor inconveniences to major crises. High energy bills, poor service, and inhumane shutoffs are just some of the things we know need to change. Tell us your story to help show why we need to take our community's energy future back from greedy corporations like RG&E, and replace RG&E with a public utility!
Metro Justice often shares stories posted here on social media to build awareness around RG&E issues and momentum for a public utility as the solution. If you have any questions regarding how Metro Justice may share your story, please don't hesitate to reach out to our Organizing Director, Mohini Sharma ([email protected], 585-397-3534) or our Organizer and Policy Specialist for the RED Campaign, Michelle Wenderlich ([email protected], 585-397-3539).
In September ’21 RGE stopped billing for 7 months and I received bills in excess of $9,000. My bill almost doubled to ~$1200 per month with blame on American power & gas. American power confirmed their itemized charges with me and RGE was adding extra charges or seemed to be duplicating charges.
From May to Jun of ‘22 I spent countless hours on hold with RGE, no help, hung up on and then RGE disconnected my service in error without me knowing.
In June 22 I filed 1st complaint with PSC and spent many more hours of calls to get my RGE account back online and service restored.
Even though my business was closed for summer season, I was still billed ~$1000 per month for basically outside entrance lights and a basement sub pump. RGE claims high rate now is due to my on-demand smart meter and will not admit there is a billing or meter problem. They say the problem was in years past and was previously inaccurate by RGE. Even though I am not using anywhere close to $1000/mo energy, the only option is to disconnect my service which I can’t do since basement will flood without the sub pump.
8/22 RGE autopay stopped again in error same as previous year. After my 2nd PSC complaint and many more calls, they billed me in January of this year 2023 for the previous months.
Now my bill averages over $2000/month more than double previous years and nothing has changed inside my business or building with the same equipment. RGE blames short staff, errors in their billing and energy estimations in the past that are now ‘read each month and accurate’.
I live in a pretty small house and nothing has changed as far as electrical or gas usage.
They have not been able to provide me an answer as to why my bill is so high, they just send me screenshots of my bill via email. Forget trying to call, I was on hold for over an hour the last time I called and ended up hanging up before I was able to speak to a human.
NY is just giving us more and more reasons to move away out of the state. Like there weren’t enough reasons prior..
After he adjusted my read, the bill was once again readjusted to the wrong read and I was recharged the same amounts I was credited. I received 7 bills due on one day to bring me right back to the same gas reading error. It’s caused great stress. The representatives make it clear they do not care and will not help. I am very stressed over this. I’ve never had to deal with an RGE error so I didn’t realize how aweful this company was. I want to change vendors but how do you even do that? It’s truly unbelievable.
I have noticed that, as well, for the past few months that the meter reading guy never comes anymore. I have had to call and make an appointment to get actual reads. In one of my calls I asked why they haven’t been by and the CSR said that there is no guarantee that they will come or not. What???
Last and final straw: my bill for November was $87.66…about average. My latest bill was for $317.61 and I knew that cannot be right. I called and after the typical long wait, I was transferred to several folks as I tried to get an explanation why the bill was so high. I never got any explanation that made sense to me and was told that I was wrong and that the amount was correct and “a bit higher” because of a prior billing deficit—which I find impossible to believe. I hung up being frustrated and angry, as I feel I have no other recourse than to pay it. I totally support your efforts to make RG&E a public utility, because the way it is now is nothing less than a totally dysfunctional entity.
Calls to the customer service line can cause a wait of close to an hour. Even then the answers are disappointing.
I have been an RG&E customer since 1970. RG&E customers have always paid a premium for utilities and service, but it was tolerated because of good service (and no alternative). Now the RG&E can only be described as a seriously mismanaged and expensive operation. And we have no alternative.
Time for a change. Public utility like Fairport is a great idea. I vote yes!
Ever since I opened my case I was told that I would I was never to be fined or have my gas shut off while this case was being resolved both by the PSC & RG&E. Yet on 9/8/22 RG&E fined me $100 per each account and after I received both of the bills with the fines I contacted the PSC on 9/19/22 to inform them about the situation and was told that RG&E would be contacted about it. I never heard from RG&E at all so I contacted the PSC twice again on 9/20/22 and spoke to two different people there and they advised me to just pay my regular bill and not to pay the fines as they were never supposed to be charged to my accounts while my case is under investigation and review. So I paid the basic bill on both accounts as the PSC staff advised me to do.
Then on Saturday 11/26/22 RG&E shut off my gas without any warning and after 1 hour on the phone with the gas emergency department they refused to turn it back on. My rights state that RG&E is not allowed to shut off utilities on a Friday, Saturday, Sunday or during holidays. Since they turned off my gas on a Saturday and on a holiday weekend they violated that right of mine.
I also qualify for Special Protections which state that RG&E cannot disconnect service for 30 days if you are elderly (I am 67) or if you are disabled and a doctor certifies that you have a medical emergency. I have a certified doctor’s letter stating that, and also a Social Security letter verifying proof of disability which I submitted to RG&E more than once and they confirmed receipt of them via e-mail on 10/22/22 and again on 11/10/22, and per my phone conversation with Julie on 10/18/22 in the billing & payment department she confirmed stated that the Special Protection notice was put on record for both of my accounts with them. I have two accounts which this shut off affects. Yet even though I qualify with both criteria they also violated this right of mine as well.
Also because of the gas shut off they just took away my right for the PSC to possibly decide in my favor which would have eliminated the need for anyone having to enter my home at all and putting me in danger. Therefore I was forced against my will to have to face serious injury or death and the stress of it all amongst other things has severely impacted my health.
My gas service was shut off for 17 days (11/26/22 – 12/12/22) making it extremely difficult to function in my home at all. This put me in grave danger for all of the health reasons I outlined in my previous letter to you, and I was constantly worried that home was going to be destroyed as well, if the loss of heat caused my water pipes to freeze and burst. I was also very worried about the damage the cold could have done in many, many other ways. There is potential major structural damage to all of my walls and ceilings. My home is very old and all of those are made of plaster not drywall which cracks when it is cold. Then there many items too numerous to list, and which are irreplaceable, which are also negatively impacted by the cold as well. My home has several floors and rooms – basement, first floor, second floor and an attic which were all fully properly heated and this was impossible to do. I cannot have anyone come in to repair any damage or replace any of the items that could have been getting damaged because of this outage and I have been too sick to evaluate that possible damage at this time. My quality of life was seriously harmed and again due to my health issues I cannot have anyone enter my home to repair the damage that the gas shut off could have caused. Also stress is the worst thing that anyone with illnesses especially as many as I have should have to be exposed to. The stress that this situation has forced me to deal with has greatly exacerbated all of my health issues now and the toll this has taken on both my physical and emotional health is indescribable beyond words.
There is no good excuse for they did and there must be some way that they can be held accountable for it! Therefore I am asking that the PSC fines and takes whatever other actions they can against RG&E for what they have done to me. Nobody, especially a disabled senior should ever have to be put through the nightmare that they forced me to endure!
Linda – Very concerned RG&E customer
I will give you a short history of my tale that has led me to send this email and pursue media exposure and possible class action legal action against this crooked monopoly.
During 2020, I, like many others lost my job. As a single parent— I felt grateful for the unemployment stipend— but didn’t anticipate being out of work for almost a year. During this time, my daughter and I moved in with my aging parents. It was a win-win for us both: since we couldn’t qualify for a new lease without proof of employment— having steady housing was a blessing. My father was suffering from dementia and needed more support; I was able to help out with yardwork and home improvement tasks. Everyone benefitted.
Fast forward to our first energy bill. During COVID, RG&E estimated my parents’ bill and their monthly bills were in the $130 range. Affordable for 2 retirees on social security and one pension. Then, after a year, they requested a meter read— so I did what I had done in previous apartments: I took a picture of each meter and emailed it to the customer service email with the account number and account holder’s name. A few days later I received an email that my meter reading was received and I felt a sense of peace. I had assumed this meant a human had recorded the numbers and they would reflect in my parents’ next bill.
Fast forward to the next bill: and it is $100 more!!!! Yes, 2 more people were living in the house, but the energy usage wouldn’t have gone up that much. The meter read I sent was also reflecting the past month— when my parents were living solo. Needless to say, this stressed my parents out immensely. Being on a fixed income, they immediately got on the phone and waited the 45 minutes to an hour most people have to wait to speak to a human on the line and were told that the meter read sent meant that RG&E was underestimating my parents’ bill. Thus, they tacked an extra $800 onto the next bill to reflect what they underpaid last year— and tacked it onto a “payment plan”. My mom started sobbing.
As I was not an account holder, I was unable to speak to a customer service agent on their behalf. I continued to send in the picture readings for them— assuming it would balance out. It went up. And kept going up.
Fast forward to today: as I sit in my new apartment that has its own RG & E account. Because my apartment has baseboard heating, I called the energy company to find out the estimated monthly bill before renting. They told me it was $84. I thought that sounded reasonable. After a month of inhabiting my new— albeit rather small one-bedroom apartment, I have to call RG&E again because I can’t access my online account and I didn’t get an email that my meter reading was received. After my hour-long wait— the customer service and billing representative tells me some very disconcerting news that inspired me to write to the media.
She said, and I quote: “Don’t send meter readings in through email or the app— they normally don’t work and end up messing up people’s bills. Your best bet is to call them between 7 and 8 am when you won’t have to wait. Do that a few times and then you can call in can do it through the automated system when you feel comfortable with sharing the meter reads.”
I literally couldn’t speak for a moment. I was in complete shock. My jaw dropped. I remember seeing news stories and reading local articles about people with thousands of dollar bills beside themselves. Was this why?!?!
I bluntly asked her, If your online system isn’t working, why are you still having people use it? Isn’t that just messing up people’s bills?
“Yes,” she said, very matter-of-factly. I knew she was low on the totem poll, I knew I had to go somewhere big with this information. I was literally shaking inside when I hung up the call.
Okay, she gave me the secret, but what about the thousands of Rochesterians that don’t know and continue to use the app or send in pictures and are overpaying as my parents did— and still are?!
My deep concern here is: how are they justifying this glitch? Their system is archaic. They don’t have the manpower to update it— and they are letting things go on in a crooked way so that good people suffer. People on fixed budgets are forgoing basic needs for heat. It is not right. If this doesn’t speak class action lawsuit, I don’t know what does!?
It seems like we would benefit from some undercover reporting of the issue or an inside whistleblower. I am personally going to take this information down to the Waring road location and see what can be done to rectify my mother’s energy bill now that she is a widow. My father passed away during this process and this is one more stressor she doesn’t need.
One final fact I will share: this representative also shared with me that the best thing to do was let them read my meter in lieu of sending in email or app readings. And the budget she quoted me: over $200 for my apartment! She told me the previous representative was reading information from my last apartment. My latest energy bill (and I haven’t sent in meter readings because now I don’t trust their system AT ALL) was $274!!! At this point, I am going to have to move, as this cost, coupled with my rent is way beyond my single parent budget. I’m counting pennies as it is in my daily life!
In sum: what is going on there is a mess— from poorly trained customer service reps—to perhaps being understaffed (but definitely not underfunded) and technologically in the dark ages.
What happened to the NYS Green Initiative? I don’t know about you— but I’m ready to jump on the solar power train. This big bully has to be stopped. It’s going to take more than one voice. You with me?
I will give you a short history of my tale that has led me to send this email and pursue media exposure and possible class action legal action against this crooked monopoly.
During 2020, I, like many others lost my job. As a single parent— I felt grateful for the unemployment stipend— but didn’t anticipate being out of work for almost a year. During this time, my daughter and I moved in with my aging parents. It was a win-win for us both: since we couldn’t qualify for a new lease without proof of employment— having steady housing was a blessing. My father was suffering from dementia and needed more support; I was able to help out with yardwork and home improvement tasks. Everyone benefitted.
Fast forward to our first energy bill. During COVID, RG&E estimated my parents’ bill and their monthly bills were in the $130 range. Affordable for 2 retirees on social security and one pension. Then, after a year, they requested a meter read— so I did what I had done in previous apartments: I took a picture of each meter and emailed it to the customer service email with the account number and account holder’s name. A few days later I received an email that my meter reading was received and I felt a sense of peace. I had assumed this meant a human had recorded the numbers and they would reflect in my parents’ next bill.
Fast forward to the next bill: and it is $100 more!!!! Yes, 2 more people were living in the house, but the energy usage wouldn’t have gone up that much. The meter read I sent was also reflecting the past month— when my parents were living solo. Needless to say, this stressed my parents out immensely. Being on a fixed income, they immediately got on the phone and waited the 45 minutes to an hour most people have to wait to speak to a human on the line and were told that the meter read sent meant that RG&E was underestimating my parents’ bill. Thus, they tacked an extra $800 onto the next bill to reflect what they underpaid last year— and tacked it onto a “payment plan”. My mom started sobbing.
As I was not an account holder, I was unable to speak to a customer service agent on their behalf. I continued to send in the picture readings for them— assuming it would balance out. It went up. And kept going up.
Fast forward to today: as I sit in my new apartment that has its own RG & E account. Because my apartment has baseboard heating, I called the energy company to find out the estimated monthly bill before renting. They told me it was $84. I thought that sounded reasonable. After a month of inhabiting my new— albeit rather small one-bedroom apartment, I have to call RG&E again because I can’t access my online account and I didn’t get an email that my meter reading was received. After my hour-long wait— the customer service and billing representative tells me some very disconcerting news that inspired me to write to the media.
She said, and I quote: “Don’t send meter readings in through email or the app— they normally don’t work and end up messing up people’s bills. Your best bet is to call them between 7 and 8 am when you won’t have to wait. Do that a few times and then you can call in can do it through the automated system when you feel comfortable with sharing the meter reads.”
I literally couldn’t speak for a moment. I was in complete shock. My jaw dropped. I remember seeing news stories and reading local articles about people with thousands of dollar bills beside themselves. Was this why?!?!
I bluntly asked her, If your online system isn’t working, why are you still having people use it? Isn’t that just messing up people’s bills?
“Yes,” she said, very matter-of-factly. I knew she was low on the totem poll, I knew I had to go somewhere big with this information. I was literally shaking inside when I hung up the call.
Okay, she gave me the secret, but what about the thousands of Rochesterians that don’t know and continue to use the app or send in pictures and are overpaying as my parents did— and still are?!
My deep concern here is: how are they justifying this glitch? Their system is archaic. They don’t have the manpower to update it— and they are letting things go on in a crooked way so that good people suffer. People on fixed budgets are forgoing basic needs for heat. It is not right. If this doesn’t speak class action lawsuit, I don’t know what does!?
It seems like we would benefit from some undercover reporting of the issue or an inside whistleblower. I am personally going to take this information down to the Waring road location and see what can be done to rectify my mother’s energy bill now that she is a widow. My father passed away during this process and this is one more stressor she doesn’t need.
One final fact I will share: this representative also shared with me that the best thing to do was let them read my meter in lieu of sending in email or app readings. And the budget she quoted me: over $200 for my apartment! She told me the previous representative was reading information from my last apartment. My latest energy bill (and I haven’t sent in meter readings because now I don’t trust their system AT ALL) was $274!!! At this point, I am going to have to move, as this cost, coupled with my rent is way beyond my single parent budget. I’m counting pennies as it is in my daily life!
In sum: what is going on there is a mess— from poorly trained customer service reps—to perhaps being understaffed (but definitely not underfunded) and technologically in the dark ages.
What happened to the NYS Green Initiative? I don’t know about you— but I’m ready to jump on the solar power train. This big bully has to be stopped. It’s going to take more than one voice. You with me?