What are our legal rights regarding having to pay to opt out of a smart meter?
Thanks,
Sher
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What are our legal rights regarding having to pay to opt out of a smart meter?
Thanks,
Sher
Some PG&E Customers Getting Fees Reversed as CPUC Endlessly Delays Smart Meter “Opt Out” DecisionQuote:
Posted in reply to the post by poetrytalks:
Posted on August 13, 2014 by onthelevelblog
SAN FRANCISCO- Some utility customers in California are getting utility smart meter “opt out” fees reversed in hearings at the California Public Utilities Commission, even as the Commission itself drags out a decision about the legality of such fees, having postponed making a decision on the matter five times now- more than nine months beyond their statutory decision deadline.
Victory for California Public
Last Friday August 8, CPUC Administrative Law Judge W. Anthony Colbert ordered Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) to immediately remove opt out fees from the bill of a customer who has retained his analog meter.'
The complainant in this case- Thomas Rainey, a resident of Livermore, CA and a PG&E customer- challenged PG&E directly based on its tariff, claiming successfully that the opt out fees did not apply. Mr. Rainey did not indicate whether or not he wanted a smart meter, or whether he wanted to join the ‘opt out’ program.
A Concerned Observer at the hearing provided this report:
“A decision was rendered at the end of the Evidentiary Hearing by the ALJ Anthony Colbert, in Mr. Rainey’s favor.
It was so ordered that PGE is to immediately remove (AND CREDIT) and cease from charging the $75 surcharge AND each monthly $10 fee for meter reading. PG&E reluctantly had no other option but to agree to
this.
The PG&E Representative was sadly ill prepared, which the ALJ actually pointed out to him, twice.”
For further details, see the rest of this report at:
https://stopsmartmeters.org/2014/08/...-out-decision/
There is also a Yahoo Group called "Resist Fees".
Opt-out Fee: Never paid 'em, never will!
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by Runningbare:
WOW! You've got moxy! I chickened out and have been paying them all along. Does anyone know if I'll be entitled to a refund if the CPUC finally takes a stand against the opt-out fee?
treasureQuote:
Posted in reply to the post by BobHeisler:
Bob is not the only one. Many of us never consented to opt-out fees, and never have volunteered to comply with the extortion.Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by treasure:
Don't expect the CPUC to take a stand against the opt-out fee anytime soon, at least not with its current corrupt set of Commissioners and a Governator who quietly condones their crimes. If you ever get a refund, it will probably be the result of a class-action suit.
On the other hand, it remains highly unlikely they will ever "enforce" their approval of illegal opt-out fees, since there is no legal basis for that.
And so the stalemate continues, with the nominal bill rising monthly, while the connection never wavers.
But at least they've finally stopped sending the written and robocall threats to disconnect--it takes the edge off.
I WANT a smart meter! How do I go about getting one?
As I understand it, you've got it, since you apparently did not OPT OUT. (Smart meter is the default.)
I know for a fact that one of your neighbors there at Two Acre Woods opted out and is paying $10 / month (or is it $20?) for intentionally saying NO to the smart meter default.
treasure
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by scamperwillow:
No, Sebastopol told PG&E they could not come into Sebastopol, so I don't have one. I find it rather unfair that since a few people complained, everyone in Sebastopol is now not allowed to have one.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by treasure:
OK - I think smart meters are a critical piece of the smart grid which we are going to have to shift to so we can use more localized energy like solar. The huge grid out there now is crumbling anyway. I want to be able to see my energy usage - both to help manage how I use it and just out of curiosity. I have a wifi router on my desk right next to me, so I am not worried about a small meter on the outside of my house. I probably would not want a big bank of meters right outside my house though, so I can understand where you are coming from.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by sealwatcher:
"Not ALLOWED to have one"? Why would you want one? They emit powerful radio pulses every 3.7 seconds, causing head pain, chest pain, palpitations, arrhythmia, anxiety and restless sleep for those who are sensitive. In addition, in some instances, SmartMeters have caused fires. They're designed to be an invasion of your privacy by communicating with future home appliances equipped with chips. This would allow utility companies to "dial down" your consumption during peak hours. That's not a world I want to live in.
It's the pulsing nature of the RF signal that's more dangerous than your continuous wi-fi signal.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by scamperwillow:
I caved too, when, after a year of non-payment, they threatened to turn my power off.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by treasure:
I've been paying too, at least a year now...
ahhh....yes...trusting in the leadership of PG&E...the company that is pushing hard to reopen the highly dangerous Diablo Canyon Nuke...the company that was negligent in the San Bruno explosion, and many more explosions that are not so well publicized. The company that brought a cityfull of cancers that Erin Brockovich eventually discovered...the company that never apologizes for wrongdoing, and only fixes it when exposed...
this company you want to trust?
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by scamperwillow:
Before anyone thinks there is an asset to having a smart meter, consider that the state of Nevada is now investigating them due to a spate of home fires originating from them. A woman died in one of these fires.
https://www.rgj.com/story/news/2014/...ared/15897355/
Saskatchewan power is replacing 105,000 smart meters due to home fires:
https://globalnews.ca/news/1485714/s...eters-premier/
PG&E is replacing 70,000 meters in Portland, OR due to house fires:
https://www.oregonlive.com/business/...ectricity.html
Lakeland, FL replacing smart meters due to house fires:
https://www.lakelandelectric.com/You...al-meters.aspx
Several other states have reported problems with house fires and appliance fires. In some places the smart meters have been replaced with the old dumb meters which don't cause the problems.
Then there is the issue of EMFs. The smart meter emits a burst of microwave energy every few minutes that is 1000 times stronger than a cell phone. Microwaves do disrupt cell structure. It took the deaths of a few radio technicians back in the early days of the technology to realize that microwaves from broadcast towers can damage the human body. Now they turn them off before they work on them. But your smart meter emits powerful transmission bursts throughout the day and night and it's not on a pole high in the air. Walls don't stop microwaves.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by scamperwillow:
Thank you for your comments. There's one critical correction I need to make. The RF pulses you're referring to don't occur once every few minutes, but rather about every 3.7 seconds! It's the pulsing nature of the signal that is harmful to some individuals.
Here's a bizarre side-note to this discussion: After having two SmartMeters removed from my home, I continued to hear a low volume, but high-pitched ringing in my ears when I went to bed, probably from my next-door neighbor's meters. In March, I had a DVR receiver placed in my bedroom by Directv. Since then, the ringing stopped, possibly because a wave created by the DVR receiver is cancelling out that of the neighbor's meters.
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by phooph:
Get the whole truth about the incidence of fires from the utility's boots on the ground, the fieldworkers. Pat Wrigley, a former meter reader, was fired by PG$E for blowing the whistle. First they fire the meters, then they fire the readers. Hear Pat's blunt testimony at a PUC hearing in Santa Rosa over 2 years ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnxIoItNUek#t=140
Lest anyone think these fires only happen in somebody else's town, recall that within the same month of April, 2011, both Coddingtown and the Mall had "electrical fires" at their meter panels.
Electrical fire causes power outage at Coddingtown JC Penney store April 21, 2011 https://www.pressdemocrat.com/csp/mediapool/sites/PressDemocrat/News/story.csp?cid=2297024&sid=555&fid=181
JC Penney closes after another electrical panel explodes in Santa Rosa Coddingtown mall, the third reported electrical panel fire in Santa Rosa within a few weeks. Although the newspaper article does not report it, the manager of the store confirmed these were smart meters involved in the explosion and fire.“The JC Penney store at Santa Rosa’s Coddingtown shopping center remained closed on Thursday afternoon because of an early morning electrical explosion and fire that cut off power to the store, fire officials said… An electrical panel in a utility room had exploded and begun burning, sending smoke into the first and second floors of the building, fire officials said.”
‘Smart’ Meters Explode, Cause Fire in Santa Rosa Mall https://www.pressdemocrat.com/csp/me...id=555&fid=181
Posted on April 13, 2011 by onthelevelblog
What was initially reported simply as an "electrical fire" in Santa Rosa's downtown last Thursday turned out to be a huge bank of smart meters spontaneously combusting
SANTA ROSA– It was confirmed today that an electrical fire which led to the evacuation of downtown Santa Rosa Plaza last Thursday evening was caused by a bank of newly installed PG&E ‘smart’ meters. Reported by the Santa Rosa Press Democrat last Thursday, the mainstream media has so far neglected to include that the source of ignition was indeed at least 3 ‘smart’ meters within the utility room. Reached for comment, Santa Rosa Fire Dept. battalion chief Jack Piccinini told SSM! that ‘all the electric meters within the room were smart meters. An electrical arc occurred that started the fire.” The Press Democrat reported:“When firefighters arrived, they found smoke and flames coming from a room of electrical panels on the mall’s east side, near the Third Street underpass.The official report from the Santa Rosa Fire Dept. states:
Three of the panels that supply power to the Disney Store, Eddie Bauer and a vacant room “literally blew up,” said Jack Piccinini, battalion chief with the Santa Rosa Fire Department.
‘Whatever shorted them out was quite significant,” he said. “I’m not an electrician so I won’t guess what it was.’”
“On investigation, ME01 found 3 PG&E meters that had blown off the electrical panel causing damage to the interior wiring of the electrical panel. A fire was still smoldering but left in place until the arrival of PG&E.”The Santa Rosa Fire Department’s incident report cites ‘arcing’ caused by ‘failure of equipment.’ Whether the cause of the arcing was related to faulty installation or inherent flaws within the ‘smart’ meters themselves is not known at this time. In a Stop Smart Meters! exclusive interview in January with the ‘Wellington Whistleblower’, a former employee of the firm contracted to install PG&E’s ‘smart’ meters alleges unsafe installations:
Though the procedure is relatively simple, if you get it wrong this can lead to arcing, shorts- even house fires. The blades on the back of the meter have to be aligned properly with the jaws on the socket the meter gets placed in. I kept hearing one of the managers say, “you guys weren’t trained properly.”In light of the series of cost cutting (and profit boosting) measures that led to the San Bruno blast last September, questions are sure to be forthcoming regarding the Public Utilities Commission’s actions regarding this incident and the many other fire safety issues that have been reported in connection with ‘smart’ meters both here and abroad as compiled by the EMF Safety Network. There is also growing concern from firefighters as well as electrical engineers that the ‘smart’ meters indeed pose a fire hazard.
At press time, neither PG&E nor the CPUC had returned calls seeking comment on this incident.
A man died in a house fire in Vacaville on July 9 2010. Reports were that a Smart Meter had been installed a day before, and led to humming sounds, snapping sound, burnt out lap top. The fire apparently started in the swamp cooler, which has a variable speed motor. The motor in the cooler was apparently ‘burned to a crisp’. PG&E was called and they shut off the power to the house. Official report:
https://www.ktvu.com/news/24208641/detail.html
Quote:
Posted in reply to the post by phooph:
For those who would like to have the smart meter removed or blocked from being installed there are templates of legal documents at the Take Back Your Power website. One is a Notice and Demand, the other is an Affidavit of Negative Averment. There are instruction on the page for how to fill them out.
https://www.takebackyourpower.net/ne...-removal-2014/
For strategies on how to deal with power companies and where to find an analog (dumb) meter:
https://www.takebackyourpower.net/solutions/
Ralph Nader has weighed in on the smart meter:
https://www.takebackyourpower.net/ne...cal-despotism/