Had a nice brisk 11/2 hour walk in -32 wind chills yesterday. Helps get the cobweb out that’s for sure.

Looks like will have a chance to replenish our vitamin D deficiencies this week, sunshine all the way through by the looks of it.

I am rabid with NL Hydro with their lack of respect and penny pinching ways. Below is a draft of a letter to Hydro I am working on, I hope it is self explanatory, if not tell me, of course any expletives will be edited out………………………or not.

Back in late 2008 and early 2009 our Hydro meter readings were estimated over several months. This led to Hydro low balling for those readings for those several months which led to a very high reading in the month of January, hence a high bill to pay when a readier actually read the meter come January 2009.

When I received the January 2009 bill I questioned it with Hydro and was told, “Well, the estimates were taken from previous years reading and you have to pay because that January reading is the actual hydro usage”.

OK, I gave Hydro the benefit of the doubt considering the rebuild of the plant after the fire and things were in some turmoil.

Fast forward to late 2009 and early 2010: October, November and December hydro bills were estimated again. Why is a mystery as the weather sure was not a factor. I did not raise this with anyone as I decided to see where this negligence would lead.

Well it has led to a January 2010 bill three hundred dollars plus more than any monthly bill to date.

The previous three months estimated bills were low balled way lower than the previous years low balling.

This is blatantly unfair to consumers hitting them with these high bills straight after Christmas, add to that you are hit with penalties if you do not pay in full by the cut off date, add to that the January 2 2010 bill is calculated as having 37 days. This adds to more KWH use at the highest rate of 10.303 cents a KWH.

My question to Hydro and to anyone who will listen will be; why have these months been estimated for two straight years instead of actually being read? Why can’t Hydro have a meter reader on staff? At least part time to do the reading. Why does Hydro depend on present staff that are doing other jobs to do the readings? Why does Hydro send out very high bills to its customers the month after Christmas?

To give an idea of the low balling I have mentioned:

October 09 usage was 1062 KWH. November 09 usage was 1312 KWH

October 10 usage was 715 KWH November 10 usage was 715 KWH

December 09 usage was 1803 KWH

December 10 usage was 715 KWH

There seems to be a pattern there eh?

Some lazy barstard has not even bothered to look back at past usage to do the ESIMATING for the last three bills. A constant 715 KWH for those months just does not remotely correlate with reality.

This negligence and incompetence has resulted in a January reading of 4017 with a $ value of over five hundred bucks. Not nice for anyone to have to bear at this time of year. Especially very hard for people on a fixed income. Doubly hard if people on low incomes or assistance are to be stuck with these high bills when it is due to the incompetence of Hydro.

Another thing that is troubling; on the hard copy of the bills we receive from Hydro the KWH used is preceded by the previous reading and the present reading. So people could be excused for thinking that since it is there in black and white [see charts below] that that is what has been used for the previous month. Not so it seems.

We trust Hydro to read the meters correctly and bill us accordingly, looks to me that trust has been breached and people should be warned to read there meters themselves to keep a check in things.

1

Head Office: 500 Columbus Drive, PO. Box 12400, St. John's, NL, A1 B 4K7, Toll-free 1-888-737-1296

HST # R121394928

METER	PREVIOUS	PRESENT	DAYS	PREVIOUS	PRESENT	MULTIPLIER	KWH-USED
NUMBER P47316	DATE OCT 27	DATE NOV 26	USE 30	READING 64690	READING 65405	1	715

1 ACCOUNT NUMBER Head Office: 500 Columbus Drive, P.O. Box 12400, St. John's, NL, Al B 4K7, Toll-free 1-888-737-1296 HST # R121394928 METER NUMBER PREVIOUS DATE PRESENT DATE DAYS USE PREVIOUS READING PRESENT READING MULTIPLIER KWH-USED AUG 28 SEP 27 30 63260 63975 1 715

This usage chart for my account was taken off the Hydro web site. Quite the drematic increase for the past month.



Update at 11.30:
Ran into Harald Paul off the Gypsy Life doing his catching up with mail and such at the post office. All is copacetic with them though he was perplexed as to why it took so long to freeze up.
I said everybody here is as perplexed as you Harald.
They were OK for food but fuel was getting low for the engine and generators.