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By Tiffany Craig Investigative Reporter
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Published: Wed, April 02, 2008 - 6:00 pm
Last Updated: Wed, April 02, 2008 - 6:58 pm
Tiffany Craig
They got a 724 dollar electricity bill for one month of service. They were sure it was a mistake.
James Parnell says called Alabama Power as soon as the oversized bill arrived. "I was scared because I have a 4 year old and a 2 year old and if the power was to get cut off, I wouldn't know what else to do."
A meter reader came out but that still didn't fix the problem. "They checked the meter and said everything's good. I said, what you mean everything's good? They said number are good! I said no they aint."
Parnell and his family moved into the 13-hundred square foot house in late February and can't afford to pay for someone's mistake. "Something's not adding up right. That means I either have somebody stealing my power or the meter's wrong. There's gotta be a mistake."
Parnell was back on the phone with the power company when we showed up.
We took his 700 dollar power bill to the downtown office and addressed the problem with spokesperson Bernie Fogarty. "This is an unusual case it doesn't happen very often. We have seen things like this happen in the past. We always work through them as we did this time."
Fogarty says account privacy issues won't allow him to talk specifics but usually a phone call can fix the problem. Tiffany said, "He actually did call and he had someone come out and look at the meter. They said yeah that's how much you owe."
Fogarty admits that did happen. "That's correct I will verify that's exactly right. There were some other issues involved in this too and he has agreed to come into the office and we have agreed to reduce the amount of the original billing."
In the end, the Parnell's didn't owe that much at all. Alabama Power is knocking almost 500 bucks off the bill.
The Parnell's believe that they were being charged for the "courtesy" power that was on before they started renting the house. James Parnell made sure that his name was on the bill before they starting moving in but feared this mix up might happen.
The Parnell's just need to verify the date that they moved into the house and the bill will be fixed.
Alabama Power officials say this was an uncommon case and ask that you call the number on your bill if you have problems.
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Strangely enough, I had an enormous bill for January and Feb too. Too high for what we use here. I use a window unit for heat. REALLY. And it’s not on 24/7. Otherwise, I have an energy star washer, dryer and a gas water heater. Our refrigerator uses $40 of electricity a year. So where is the electricity being used?