Published April 21, 2021 Last Thursday, the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) adopted a transition plan to allow the state’s regulated utilities to resume service disconnections of residential customers. These utilities had been prohibited from disconnecting residential customers for nonpayment since the spring of 2020. The PUC approved a plan that will allow shutoffs to…
Published April 6, 2021 Back in December 2020, I wrote a blog about a program Xcel proposed to partially forgive unpaid utility bills of Minnesota customers who are among the farthest past-due on their bills. The “Payment Plan Credit Proposal” was one of several proposals Xcel made in the “Economic Recovery docket,” which the Public…
Published March 16, 2021 This week, the committees responsible for energy in the Minnesota House and Senate will hear identical bills aimed at addressing the severe spike in the price of natural gas that affected Minnesota gas utilities in February. The severe cold weather in Texas and the Midwest last month caused the price of…
Published October 5, 2020 A moratorium on utility disconnections remains in place for Minnesota’s regulated utilities, but some unregulated cooperative and municipal utilities have again begun shutting off customers who have past-due bills. CUB has received anecdotal reports of shutoffs by more than two dozen cooperative and municipal utilities located across Minnesota. It is difficult…
Published June 26, 2020 Are you worried about getting your energy bills paid? Maybe you are already falling behind? It’s stressful to worry about bills piling up, having your electricity or natural gas shut off, or not being able to get your propane tank filled. Getting your utilities shut off or having an empty fuel…
Updated January 26, 2021 According to a report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, nearly 1 in 3 American households reported challenges in paying utility bills in 2015. Keeping electricity bills affordable and providing information to consumers to reduce their energy expenses is the key goal for the Citizens Utility Board. As we work to…
Published January 3, 2019 Sometimes, depending on the weather or other circumstance, it can be hard to keep up with utility bills and you might fear getting your utilities shut off. Fortunately, Minnesota law contains several protections for consumers. There are a few different instances described below in which your utilities could be potentially shut…
As a consumer advocate, CUB guides residential and small business consumers on how to address a variety of energy-related questions and concerns. In this blog, we’ll share some of the topics that people look to us for help. We encourage you to reach out to us about these topics and others. If we can’t help,…
