More massive RG&E bills after businesses and homes go months without getting one

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — After we first exposed this issue Monday, we heard from all kinds of customers who said they got the same kind of surprise RG&E bill in the mail.

RG&E tells us the root problem is they didn’t get actual meter reads from these customers every month. But the customers we talked to say that’s not the explanation they got.

When they called customer service they were told it was a "glitch" in billing. This is the scenario.

People never got billed in December, January and February and the bill that arrived this week was a huge amount of money.

The issue happened to Joe Gizzi at Big City Sportswear in Gates. No RG&E bills since Thanksgiving and the one that arrived this week was more than $21,000.

"Our people were on the phone for several hours just trying to figure out what was going on," Gizzi said.

David Cinquanti says he started trying to reach RG&E when his December bill never showed. A bill combining three months just arrived and charged him more than $700.

Brean: "Now RG&E says the core problem here is not getting meter reads. But you say you give them your reading every month."

David Cinquanti: "Every month I send my meter reads directly to RG&E."

RG&E said, "Missing meter reads are the root cause for most billing delays."

We have a bill that records meter readings.

Even though the record shows "actual" meter reads for March, February and January, RG&E the "estimated" reading in December delayed the billing for three months.

By then the total was more than $6,000.

"The bills are difficult to read to begin with," Rizzi said. "So when you get three months into one it makes it even tougher."

From RG&E Wednesday:

This multi-month delay in billing was the result of a missing December meter read. Even though there were subsequent actual reads in January and February, the missed December read prevented the billing system from automatically issuing a bill. Manual intervention was required to enter an estimated December read, which allowed the billing system to calculate a bill for all of the outstanding billing periods.

This response addresses this account, but there are many different scenarios that could require different explanations. Customers can contact us at 1-800-743-2110 for an explanation of their bill and to set up payment arrangements if needed.