Didn’t use hydro, but was being billed delivery and GST
MINDEMOYA—A Mindemoya homeowner and businessman is perplexed with Hydro One’s billing practices, but says he will not be paying a long-standing bill because he had requested power be turned off at his farm property in Providence Bay several years ago, but has continued to be charged delivery service charges and GST. This despite not using hydro.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” stated Elwin Shaw, on Tuesday. He explained, “in 2013, when I purchased a farm property on Blue Road, in Providence Bay, hydro was already connected and in place. The farm had crops on it, but there was no water-the pump was not hooked up in the well. Hydro was hooked up to the pole and the barn that was there blew down. There was no hydro used on the property. There is a separate deed on the property for five acres, for a hunt camp, but there was never any hydro use their either.”
Despite not using hydro, “we received a bill from Hydro One (which he paid up) and at that time I called them and asked them to disconnect the power at the farm,” said Mr. Shaw. “Then I got another bill a couple of months later, again saying on the bill there was zero usage-in fact there was four categories on the bill and they all said zero kilowatt usage. But they were still charging for delivery costs and GST.”
Again, “I received another bill and I called Hydro One and told them of my request and the guy I talked to (with Hydro One) said I was not authorized to have hydro disconnected, that the bill was in my grandsons’ names, even though I have the deed for the property.”
So about every three months since, Mr. Shaw said he has been receiving a hydro bill, which again states zero use but includes a delivery service charge and GST on top of that. “As the time has gone up the balance on this bill has gone up as well,” he noted.
“So again I called Hydro One to disconnect the line because we weren’t and hadn’t been using hydro on the property,” said Mr. Shaw. “The same guy I had talked to at Hydro originally played the original tape of my request to have the power disconnected, but it only had on it what he had said, not my request for power to be disconnected; obviously this part had been erased.”
“Anyway, in October of this past year (2015), after better than three years, I got a bill stating that if I didn’t pay my bill then they would disconnect the power,” said Mr. Shaw. “Three days later hydro pulled the plug on the connection, the meter base was down as was the power source for the hydro pole. Then I received a call the other day that I owe Hydro One in the area of $600 and they said if I don’t pay the bill by February 17 they will be taking me to a collection agency.”
“The boys (his grandsons) had been under age when I had first requested the power be disconnected and we have no idea how the bill is in their names,” continued Mr. Shaw. “Yes, one of my grandsons’ names is on the property with me now.”
“Now Hydro One is saying they are going to take me to collection, but I can easily beat this case, because I kept most of the bills that say zero use with a delivery charge and interest on the bills,” said Mr. Shaw. “What I’m concerned about is that one of my grandsons is of age and getting married soon and he may end up wanting to get hydro connected to where he is going to live and Hydro One might refuse him because his name is on this bill here.”
“No, I’m not going to pay the bill, absolutely not,” added Mr. Shaw.
