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recently caught the attention of state utility regulators, not to mention the Rogue Desk, for its frosty response to customers in the depths of winter.
The state Public Utility Commission heard from 14 customers who complained about having to wait five days or longer to get service restored after they'd paid their delinquent NW Natural bills in late January and early February.
"We had so many complaints coming in, and they were not following their own tariff," says Clark Jackson, the PUC's manager of consumer services.
NW Natural's policy, which it wasn't following with these 14 customers, was to reconnect customers within three business days. But the complaints prompted the PUC to take the rare step of making a special rule to deal with Roguish behavior by only one utility.
On Feb. 16, the commission said NW Natural and other regulated utilities in Oregon must restore customers' service within one day of the time they pay their bills. Jackson says NW Natural was the only utility not already complying with that standard.
Victoria Lukenovich, a 27-year-old mother of three in Gresham, was one of the 14 customers NW Natural left out in the cold. After having her gas turned off because of a billing mix-up, Lukenovich and her family used their electric oven to keep warm amid near-freezing temperatures for five days before NW Natural resumed service.
"It's scary because, yeah, I'm fine, but I'm constantly worried about if [my kids] are warm enough," Lukenovich says.
NW Natural spokesman Gregg Kantor says the long waits for customers wanting gas service restored reflected the company's effort to balance their needs with service calls to customers who had not fallen behind in their bills.
According to Kantor, NW Natural is willing to work with anyone having trouble paying their bills to find assistance programs or create a payment plan.
A word of advice from the Rogue Desk: Take the company up on the offer. Otherwise, you might be left searching the yard next winter for sticks to rub together.
WWeek 2015