Customers owed less than 2 cents a month, Atlantic City Electric says
Atlantic City Electric says overbilling found by a federal audit likely amounts to less than 25 cents for a full year.
“No one in South Jersey is buying it,” Congressman Jeff Van Drew said.
Customers have complained for more than a year as they have seen their bills double.
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, auditors found five areas of financial noncompliance and made 22 recommendations to Atlantic City Electric Co., after examining the five-year period from Jan. 1, 2021 to Dec. 31, 2025.
That included overbilling customers.
Atlantic City Electric first told BreakingAC it would need to look into exactly what that meant for customers’ refunds.
On Friday, they said their initial analysis confirmed with FERC staff found that “any refund would amount to less than two cents per month over a 12-month period.”
“The only thing worth two cents is Atlantic City Electric’s response,” Van Drew shot back.
“FERC has confirmed that transmission customers were overcharged, and those transmission costs are ultimately passed through in what customers pay,” he continued. “During the same period, families watched their electric bills double and, in some cases, triple.”
Atlantic City Electric has pointed to he increase in energy supply prices that they do not control as a majority of the bigger bills customers were seeing.
“We care about our customers and are committed to keeping energy costs as low as possible. That’s why we take the findings from the recent FERC audit seriously and are implementing its recommendations to strengthen our processes,” the company said the statement announcing the pennies finding.
“First we were told nothing was wrong, and people were simply using more electricity,” Van Drew said. “Then we were told residential customers were not impacted by this. Now we are being told the impact is less than two cents a month.”
He promised to follow up with FERC, and will push for the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities “to finally do its job and get to the bottom of this.”
“Atlantic City Electric has broken the trust of the people of South Jersey,” Van Drew said. “The answer is simple: show us the full numbers, refund every dollar people are owed, lower the rates, and lower the transmission and delivery costs. We are not letting this go.”