NB Power customers say high bills don’t make sense

Many NB Power customers say their power bills are too high.

Amid cold temperatures, many New Brunswickers say they’re paying more to heat their homes.

“I was prepared for it to be a little higher, just based on what everyone else was saying, but when it came out $300 more, I was shocked,” said Beth Hoyt-Whelan, who lives in Marysville.

Hoyt-Whelan says she spent more than $100,000 worth on energy-improvement renovations at her home following an NB Power energy audit with the assumption it would decrease her energy usage, and her bill, each month.

Her 4,000-square foot, 1880s home received two additional heat pumps, new windows, doors, insulation and sills in the basement.

“The very next year in 2023, that winter, my bills reflect the renovations. It was awesome,” she said. “December of 2023 into January, that bill came and it was almost cut in half by the renovations.”

However, the financial relief was short lived when Hoyt-Whelan opened her bill this month.

“I do realize that this period of the same report period last year is three days more for whatever reason they did the billing three days more, but three days doesn’t equal $300,” she said.

On Tuesday, NB Power said the increases in recent power bills were due partly to a colder December as well as a longer billing cycle and higher rates.

“New Brunswickers are already struggling to pay their bills and this unusual expense is very stressful for people,” said Barb MacKinnon, a Nasonworth resident.

Earlier this week the provincial government requested a third-party review of the recent bills. The Public Accounts Committee is expected to receive the findings on Feb. 18.

Energy Minister René Legacy says the latest figures he received from NB Power their call centre has received nearly 2,000 calls and it is average 350 emails per day due to the issue.

“The way the conversation was happening over the last week, I was just getting somewhat concerned that the confidence wasn’t there anymore so we need to keep that because power bills, no matter what comes out of this study, are going up, it is getting colder and we need to have some really hard discussions with New Brunswickers and we need to do that in full confidence of the players that are around the table,” Legacy said. “Everything is being put into question and that’s going to be really hard going forward so if there is a problem with something that we can fix it and rebuild that confidence. If there isn’t, then at least we can have that conversation that maybe brings us back to a starting point to say, ‘Okay, it’s getting expensive for energy, what do we do now,’” he said.

Legacy notes this could be “the perfect storm,” pointing to colder temperatures, longer bills and the fact some parts of the province saw extended power outages in December 2023, which would impact their bills differently.

“All these elements would explain some of the percentage of increase, but what I’m getting from emails, it’s just too high for that to explain, so that’s why we need agents at NB Power to grab the information, get as much as they can to see if there’s some commonality in what’s going on,” he said.

MacKinnon says she did call NB Power when she noticed an increase in her monthly charges.

“I phoned NB Power and told them what was going on at my house. They made some suggestions for me to examine my own energy uses like testing the draw on each breaker in my house, so I did that and found no anomalies and I have asked my heat pump service technicians to drop by to make sure that it’s not that that’s causing the draw,” she said.

She says while he home is pretty energy efficient overall, there are areas where all New Brunswickers could improve to help with consumption across the province.

“Should the investigation identify any issues or recommendations, we will act immediately to address them,” said NB Power president and CEO Lori Clark in a statement to CTV News Atlantic. “Our goal is to ensure that our customers have confidence in the accuracy of their bills and trust in the systems we use to serve them.”

News of the audit has brought some optimism to customers.

“I’d like to see the study that looks at it compare NB Power’s usage to a Saint John Power’s usage so they can tell whether it’s an internal or an external issue to their services, but I’d be interested to see what comes of it and I hope that they do find a way to lower our power bills back to normal again,” said MacKinnon.

Hoyt-Whelan adds it needs to be addressed quickly because not only do the bills not make sense, but as a realtor it could impact future house sales when the bills don’t reflect an accurate amount.

“We need to verify is it the consumption that we’re misinformed about? Is it the actual cost? Like, I can see on there that I got the 10 per cent rebate for $41, so I saw that on my bill, that was awesome, I didn’t expect that, that didn’t even seem to make a difference,” she said. “It was still $300 more after that, so there does need to be an investigation.”

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