State to investigate Consumers Energy after receiving complaints of malfunctioning meters - Detroit Free Press

State will investigate Consumers Energy after receiving complaints

State to investigate Consumers Energy after receiving complaints of malfunctioning meters
Adrienne Roberts

The Michigan agency that regulates utilities said Friday it has launched an investigation into Jackson-based Consumers Energy after receiving numerous complaints from customers about malfunctioning natural gas meters, potential overbilling due to extended estimated meter readings and delays in new service installations.

The need for an investigation, which the Michigan Public Service Commission voted to approve at a meeting Friday, was determined after MPSC received complaints from customers who were frustrated by malfunctioning meters not showing the amount of electricity used, the commission said in a news release. Customers were concerned about their bills being abnormally high without accurate meter readings.

It comes as Michigan's largest energy providers — Consumers Energy and Detroit-based DTE Energy Co. — are already facing scrutiny after hundreds of thousands of state residents lost power after a February ice storm and a March winter thundersnow. Utility executives point to more severe weather happening more often in Michigan as one major reason for the outages and say they're trimming more trees, putting smart devices on the grid to isolate outages and reroute power and moving infrastructure underground, among other actions, to reduce the frequency and duration of outages.

More on DTE and Consumers: DTE and Consumers say they need to raise rates as outages mount

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Investigations of utilities happen fairly frequently but are "generally reserved for significant issues affecting service quality or violations of rules governing how service must be provided," Matt Helms, a MPSC spokesperson, said. In recent years, the commission has investigated Consumers Energy and DTE over the August 2022 power outages and it also investigated alternative natural gas supplier Realgy Energy Services in 2021 over business and marketing practices.

Consumers Energy spokesperson Brian Wheeler said in an emailed statement that the utility is "committed to doing right by its customers and improving our performance and communications. We will cooperate with the commission on this effort and are focused on delivering the service our customers and the MPSC expect."

The complaints came as the utility, which provides natural gas and/or electricity to 6.7 million Michigan customers, worked to transition its electric meters from using 3G cellular telephone technology to 4G-based meters, MPSC said.

MPSC said it approved Consumers Energy's using alternative testing procedures for the meters being removed from service and upgraded to 4G technology in 2019, but in investigating complaints, MPSC staff found that the utility was estimating bills for many electric customers with 3G meters before cellular phone companies discontinued operating 3G service in January 2023.

The meters were not working and showed blank screens, MPSC said, meaning both customers and Consumers Energy could not pull actual readings from the meters.

MPSC staff learned Consumers Energy had been aware of the malfunctions — which it blamed on battery contamination issues that could cause the blank screens — since 2020, with more than 900,000 meters potentially at risk, the commission said.

MPSC also said it received 177 complaints from January 2022 to May 2023 about Consumers Energy's inability to meet the MPSC requirement that 90% of new service installations must be completed within 15 business days.

The order directs the utility to provide information to the commission such as an explanation of its communications with customers about estimated reads and whether customers were receiving estimated readings because of the 3G issue or because of malfunctioning meters, among other issues, by Aug. 4.

MPSC staff will then analyze the data Consumers Energy provides and make recommendations to address these issues by Sept. 29.

Separately, Consumers Energy announced Wednesday that it is proposing a targeted undergrounding pilot program pending approval from the MPSC. The pilot will study resiliency improvements that result from burying power lines and will target circuits in Genesee, Livingston, Allegan, Ottawa, Montcalm and Iosco counties that have frequent, lengthy outages and are in areas with dense trees.

Contact Adrienne Roberts: amroberts@freepress.com.