2015 Billing Analysis and Review

In February and March of 2015, TVEC received a number of inquiries from members expressing concern over higher than expected electric bills. In response, the TVEC Board of Directors directed Management to secure third party services for a comprehensive review and analysis of TVEC’s billing and metering practices.

TVEC Management secured the services of Guernsey, an engineering, architecture and consulting firm headquartered in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma to perform the review and analysis.

A full copy of the report may be downloaded here.

Summary of Findings:

Member Consumption – “The increases in January Member consumption over December consumption is directly related to the increase in heating degree days over the same period of time. Official weather data provides credible evidence that electric consumption should have increased for most electric consumers, including those served by TVEC. TVEC Members were among many electric consumers across the state of Texas who experienced higher than expected electric bills when compared to their previous month’s billing.”

Metering – “Guernsey did not find any abnormalities in the metering data presented for review. Cooperative and third party meter accuracy tests indicate 100% of meters tested are operating within the ANSI standards for electronic metering.”

Billing – “Guernsey applied the Board approved tariff rate for approximately 60,000 accounts (180,000 total bill records) in December 2014, January 2015 and February 2015. Guernsey did not find any abnormalities in the computation of the tariff rate not normally associated with adjustments such as pro-rated customer charges, inaccessible meters and contract related charges.”

Power Cost Recovery Factor (PCRF) Recovery – “A thorough review and analysis of the Cooperative’s PCRF factor calculation shows TVEC is appropriately developing the monthly calculation to determine the PCRF factor which would recover or refund the appropriate power cost.”
Conclusion – “TVEC has thoroughly assessed all potential areas of concern in order to ensure the Cooperative is appropriately responding to Member concerns regarding higher than expected bills.

The Cooperative has assessed its:
• Bill statements
• Billing data
• AMI and non-AMI meter data
• Power Bills
• Power Cost Recovery Factor calculations
• Meter Accuracy
• Member Communications

In addition to the Cooperative’s efforts to ensure it is accurately metering and billing Members, the Cooperative enlisted the expertise of Guernsey to further review the Cooperative’s activities. Guernsey finds the Cooperative is acting in the interest of its Members. Not only has the Cooperative investigated on its own each of the aforementioned critical components of its billing function, but also provided extensive data to a third party for independent review and further analysis.
The review and analysis of metering and billing data supports the Member billing data provided for review.”