SUFFOLK, Va. (WAVY) — Some Suffolk residents say their electric bills are way out of hand — and for no reason.
“I don’t know what the deal is, I want answers I want it to be fixed,” Cindy Roach told WAVY.com.
Roach couldn’t believe her eyes when she opened her Dominion Energy bill this month. It was a whopping $432.
“We’re usually in the 200s for wintertime and this was in the 400s. Absolutely ridiculous,” she said.
She asked around and found several neighbors and friends in the same boat. One of them shared a graph showing a large, unexplained usage spike from last winter to this winter.
Her December bill was nearly $500.
That’s when Roach decided to do something.
“I was like, that’s it I’m calling WAVY 10 On Your Side because I know you’ll get to the bottom of it and find answers for us,” she said.
WAVY News asked Dominion Energy to look into bills for four customers.
“Half of them, their bills were in line from their bills the same time last year,”Dominion spokeswoman Bonita Billingsley-Harris said.
Billingsley-Harris said only one of the four customers WAVY inquired about had contacted Dominion.
She says a lot can be resolved over the phone.
“They’ll show you how to check your own meter. They’ll show you what appliances you need to check are working extra hard,” Billingsley-Harris said.
She did agree that two of the bills were much higher and ordered meter checks for all of them.
In the meantime, she recommends they get a home energy audit. Those can help any customer figure out where they’re using the most energy and how to save energy and money.
Roach says she already did that.
“Someone from Dominion came and checked our house. They checked our windows, they gave us new CFL light bulbs. They said everything was great — our house was in really great shape for saving electricity,” she said.
While she waits for more answers, Roach has turned down the thermostat a couple degrees.
Dominion says for every degree you drop, you can save 3 percent on your bill.
You can find information on getting a home energy audit here.
