When a Smart Power Balance Goes to 0
If your account reaches a negative balance, your electric service will automatically disconnect.
Note: System parameters will be set to give a grace period (no shut off) during holidays, weekends and times of extreme hot/cold weather. The first non-holiday weekday after a grace period, negative balance accounts will automatically shut off between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m.
A Prepaid Account that has had Electric Service discontinued for a period of more than 15 days will be considered inactive. A final bill will be mailed to the last known address on file.
Returned checks and any fees will be charged to the member’s account immediately, reducing the credit balance available for electric usage. If this causes the credit balance to fall to 0, service will automatically be disconnected.
Reconnection
After disconnect, the minimum credit balance to restore service is $20, plus any debt that was accrued by using electricity from the time credit ran out.
Example: If your balance dropped below zero on Sunday, with the friendly non-disconnect policy, power will remain on until 10 a.m. Monday morning. Following, it will automatically shut off between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m. To restore power, you must pay for the electricity used during that time, in addition to adding a $20 credit. If you used $5.50 worth of power, you’ll need to put $25.50 of credit on your account for power to restore. Within 15 minutes of meeting the $20 credit obligation, plus the $5.50 debt obligation, your power should restore.
Note: In the case of arrears, where a member is using a debt management plan to pay off an outstanding debt, 20% of any new purchase automatically goes to satisfy that debt. In this case, purchases should consider an additional sum to account for that and insure adequate credit is being purchased.
Power Outages
Power Outages can happen, for a myriad of reasons, regardless of whether there is a credit on the meter. Before you report a power outage, please ensure there is credit on your account, and the cause of your outage is not a negative balance. In the event of an actual outage, go here to learn how to report it.