Complaints

This profile includes complaints for Edisto Electric Cooperative, Inc.'s headquarters and its corporate-owned locations. To view all corporate locations, see Find Local Branches.

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  Edisto Electric Cooperative, Inc.

  896 Calhoun St Bamberg, SC 29003-1805

• 

  Edisto Electric Cooperative, Inc.

  PO Box 547 Bamberg, SC 29003-0547

The complaint text that is displayed might not represent all complaints filed with BBB. Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business.

• Initial Complaint

  Date:09/30/2024

  Type:Customer Service Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  Hello I am reporting on my electric company I have been impacted by the tropical storm my lights have been out going on 3 days now my food has spoiled over 200 dollars worth. But my main issue with this company is how am I still being charged for electricity when I have no lights and I have been trying to report by phone for about,3 days now and they won't let the customers to report this issue. I don't think it's fair to the consumer to be charged for a service that is not in use and how are we going to get reimbursed for our losses thank you so much for giving the consumers a voice thanks again.

  Business Response

  Date: 10/09/2024

  Good afternoon,

  Due to Hurricane Helene, approximately 75% ( 16,000-17,000) of our membership was without power beginning on September 27, 2024, to include Mrs. ******. During this time, we lost communications with our outage management system, our phone systems, and our billing and payment systems.

  Mrs. ******, is billed daily on our Pre-Pay system, meaning she pays for electricity in advance and she receives alerts when she is being billed and when her balance gets low on her account. As a result of losing communications with our billing platform, the system was estimating daily usage based upon previous usage and sending out texts alerts based upon its daily estimation. As a result of not being able to communicate with our system, we turned the notifications off and were not billing any member for any usage during the period when she had no power. 

  In fact, we have not turned the notifications back on yet,, but will do so tomorrow and the members will only be billed for actual usage and not the estimation that was going on when we first lost communications with our billing system.

  Mrs. ****** can apply for assistance through DSS for lost food items. Unfortunately, when hurricanes hit our areas we cannot control how much damage we receive and we cannot guarantee service during a hurricane event. 

• Initial Complaint

  Date:01/26/2023

  Type:Billing Issues
  Status:

  AnsweredMore info

  Complaint statuses

  Resolved:

  The complainant verified the issue was resolved to their satisfaction.

  Unresolved:

  The business responded to the dispute but failed to make a good faith effort to resolve it.

  Answered:

  The business addressed the issues within the complaint, but the consumer either a) did not accept the response, OR b) did not notify BBB as to their satisfaction.

  Unanswered:

  The business failed to respond to the dispute.

  Unpursuable:

  BBB is unable to locate the business.

  My rating really is no star for manager Katey/ Katie at the St
  George location. She is the most insensitive manager I have ever encountered at a utility company. I am so sick of this place.. hiring people that can't even fake empathy. I have had service for over 4 years and like any one had to get an extension ??. Had a program pending payment but yet they still wanted the arrangement amount regardless. I tried every way to explain or bargain being I am 9 months pregnant and have been laid off with dependents in my care. They wanted document directly from 3rd party or payment from me last day to pay by 5m today that was only option..this woman said we already gave you 2 weeks, we don't have anything to do with their process of paying, and sorry it's a inconvenience to you but we still need our payment for the service by 5 pm we run a business. I thought she was a debt collector reading a mini miranda. All I could do is cry ?? ?? hang up break my unborn baby piggy bank and deposit the bill in my account. This was not a little bill if you catch my drift.
  I want to be clear this piece of crap utility service is by far the worse I have ever had to voice a review not once but twice. BTW I noticed summer kw was regular winter doubled in kw usage. Even during the pandemic this company was heartless to the real world. With everything going up and assistance company in process of helping you still wanted to shut me off and have my family in the dark. SHOULD COME UP WITH BETTER PROCESS FOR TIMES LIKE THIS. I am more heart broken that I spent my unborn baby money to pay something that will be funded in less than 10 days. Wouldn't even let me get another extension.. She acted like my account was flagged as a liar.

  Business Response

  Date: 02/06/2023

  Good morning,

  Mrs. ****'s electric account in question was due to be disconnected on January 11, 2023, for a past due payment of $225.35. This bill was for her electric service from October 10,2022 through November 9, 2022, Edisto Electric allows members to go 60 days before we disconnect service. Most utilities run on a 30-day cycle. On January 9th, Mrs. **** spoke with our district manager Katie E**** and asked if she could get an extension for this bill. Mrs. E**** granted Mrs. **** an extension for two additional weeks which would make the arrears amount of $225.35 due on January 25th. Mrs. E**** explained to Mrs. **** that the bill would need to be paid by 5p.m. on the 25th of January.

  On January 24th Mrs. **** called back to see if we could extend her extension. Mrs. E**** explained that we could not. Mrs. ****. at this point has been given 74 days to pay her bill. She then told Katie E**** that an agency was paying for her bill. Mrs. E**** explained to Mrs. **** that we would need an email from the agency stating that they would be paying her bill. We would accept that email as proof, because they have sent them in the past. Mrs. **** said she tried calling them and our office manager asked her to call them again to send over an email. Mrs. **** told our office manager Katie E**** that we were inconveniencing her.

  The screenshots that Mrs. **** provided in the complaint were not shown to any of our employees in the St. George office. Mrs. **** paid her bill at 3:55 pm on January 25th to avoid disconnection. We received the requested email at 4:07 p.m. on the 25th of January from the SC Stay Plus Program and payment was made on the account by them on January 30th. 

  By the time we received payment from the SC Stay Plus program on January 30th, Mrs. **** had two more bills come due in addition to the original bill from November. The payment for the SC Stay Plus program was applied to all three bills which gave her a credit that will hopefully, help her out. 

  Thank you,

  Brian H*****

  VP Member Services 

  Edisto Electric Cooperative 

  Customer Answer

  Date: 02/06/2023

  
  
  Complaint: ********
  
  
  
  I am rejecting this response because:
  
  She would not allow me to send the notification I received by email and I specified I had proof. She rejected it and made her unempathetic remarks. She wanted a ledger directly from SC Stay plus. I dif all I could do to prevent this action. I only filed the complaint because it was truly an inconvenience I had to break into my unborn piggy bank or be in the dark. She knew they were ro pay and she stated they needed document directly from them or I needed to pay the bill they have a  business to run. I don't feel this should be down played or overlooked. If there was a recording please listen nothing I said was untruthful. Clearly they got their payment from us both..I want a refund of what I paid to avoid disconnect back. They need to come up with an implementation plan for future cases. Also the EFT processed in 1 day not 5 to 7 like most places it was processed even faster to assure a payment or disconnect.  In my case the funds was really there.  I would not go to this extent if this was a simple problem.. Edisto Electric Cooperative goes into collection mode they really don't help when people in a bind. The manager told me the same thing a regular representative did so this tells me they follow concrete guidelines they can't bend, stretch, or wiggle any strings outside of their guidelines like most utility companies. In a case like mine their should have been another extension or something granted until those funds came. Why did I feel the need to report them to BBB? It wasn't because I didn't pay it was because I was forced too along with tears on how the manager treated me during.a difficult time. I was eligible for another but she stated that the first one needed to have been met. I do have a credit because the program paid them over $1,133.91 dollars on a $753.32 bill. There is a credit because I paid on top of them. I would like my payment reversed for the EFT on the 26th of January for $226.00

  
  Sincerely,
  
  
  
  ******** ****

  Business Response

  Date: 02/09/2023

   I am sorry that Mrs. **** feels that we did not work with her. We try to help our members as much as possible. Mrs. ****'s bill from November was not due for disconnection until January 11th. Plus, we gave her an additional two weeks to try and work with her and give her additional time to make the payment which moved the disconnect date from January 11th to January 26th on a bill from November. 

  I did verify that our district office manager told Mrs. **** that she would need the information directly from SC Stay Plus stating that she was approved. Mrs. **** has stated that she has received text from them stating she was approved and she has provided them as well in this complaint. At Edisto Electric, we receive notification directly from SC Stay Plus anytime that someone is approved for funds and that was what our office manager was relying on when decisions were being made. We did not receive the approval from them until after Mrs. **** had paid the $226.00 on a bill that was in arrears. Mrs. **** is correct that we wanted verification directly from SC Stay Plus and not from her.

  We do not generally know how much SC Stay Plus is going to pay until they send us an email. Mrs. **** paid the amount that was in arrears, and it is not our practice to reimburse a member for a bill that they paid for and was actually due. SC Stay plus sent a check for $1133.91. that has given Mrs. **** a credit, like it has done for many of our members that have received assistance from The SC Stay Plus Program. With the credit, Mrs. **** will not receive a bill until that credit runs out.

  Our members expect Edisto Electric Cooperative to provide power on a 24 hour/7 day a week basis and we strive to make that happen. This requires manpower, material and equipment all of which have a cost. In order to meet those cost and to provide the service that is expected, we have to collect revenue to cover those costs.