Coming Soon to NJ - 12.35 kW Hanwha DUO-G5 + SolarEdge Inverter/Optimizers by GPE

[J.P.M.]

Two months in a row they did the estimate on me. The two months combined I should've had ~1.5MWh banked, but instead I was billed like 200kWh combined. Not sure if it had to do with my email complaining to JCP&L, but they did and actual read last month and I was credited 1.68MWh in the bank.

I'd check billing policy and see how you're charged.

I don't get estimated bills, but if I did, the way my monthly billing policies for usage works, overestimating meter readings (which could imply underestimating production) would mean I'd get billed at retail rates for months when estimates of meter readings were inflated - sort of like the POCO getting around net metering by "precharging" for power at retail rates, pocketing the money and paying for it out at wholesale rates when trueup or an actual meter reading take place.

Your POCO metering/billing policies may be and probably are different.

[njdealguy]

I'd check billing policy and see how you're charged.

I don't get estimated bills, but if I did, the way my monthly billing policies for usage works, overestimating meter readings (which could imply underestimating production) would mean I'd get billed at retail rates for months when estimates of meter readings were inflated - sort of like the POCO getting around net metering by "precharging" for power at retail rates, pocketing the money and paying for it out at wholesale rates when trueup or an actual meter reading take place.

Your POCO metering/billing policies may be and probably are different.

Wow if this is true will need to start staying on top of this and preemptively send photos of my own meter reading to the POCO on or just before the listed meter reading date.

Sounds like something POCOs would love to get away with if they could, somehow collecting as much as possible at retail rates for "mistake" estimates and then reimbursing at wholesale rates later on, this would be financially detrimental to owning solar if they would keep doing this and got away with it!

[J.P.M.]

Wow if this is true will need to start staying on top of this and preemptively send photos of my own meter reading to the POCO on or just before the listed meter reading date.

Sounds like something POCOs would love to get away with if they could, somehow collecting as much as possible at retail rates for "mistake" estimates and then reimbursing at wholesale rates later on, this would be financially detrimental to owning solar if they would keep doing this and got away with it!

I don't know if it's true for your POCO or not.

I'm pretty familiar w/my POCO's billing practices, and for this conversation how my POCO's billing policies and procedures COULD work to their advantage IF they estimated billing period usage.
My POCO does not estimate my bills.

I'm not saying your POCO is/is not playing games simply because I'm completely ignorant of what your POCO's billing policies and procedures are.

I just think cynically and have found I'm rarely disappointed.

[SunEagle]

Wow if this is true will need to start staying on top of this and preemptively send photos of my own meter reading to the POCO on or just before the listed meter reading date.

Sounds like something POCOs would love to get away with if they could, somehow collecting as much as possible at retail rates for "mistake" estimates and then reimbursing at wholesale rates later on, this would be financially detrimental to owning solar if they would keep doing this and got away with it!

I remember getting an "estimated" bill which was listed that way. My POCO for some reason had not been able to read my meter so they submitted one that was similar to the month for the year before. The good news is that they did read my meter the next month and the cost ended up being lower than usual because the estimate on the previous bill was over what I had really used.

Hopefully your POCO will end up balancing out the bills so all is balanced in the end.

[sunpoweredev]

I'd check billing policy and see how you're charged.

I don't get estimated bills, but if I did, the way my monthly billing policies for usage works, overestimating meter readings (which could imply underestimating production) would mean I'd get billed at retail rates for months when estimates of meter readings were inflated - sort of like the POCO getting around net metering by "precharging" for power at retail rates, pocketing the money and paying for it out at wholesale rates when trueup or an actual meter reading take place.

Your POCO metering/billing policies may be and probably are different.

Totally hadn't thought of it that way. Such a simple way to screw people over lol. I'd like to believe they weren't out to get me that way, given the crazy times we're in, which those 2 back to back estimated reads were in the middle of.

The actual anniversary for my system is the end of July for true up. NJ law allows a one time reset which I did and was reset to March, though I've never received any official confirmation of the change, other than a .pdf file a rep typed up when I complained the second time. If my current 1.68MWh bank (expected to be ~2.5MWh in the bill coming in a few days) goes poof, I will know then that they're out to get me.

[J.P.M.]

Totally hadn't thought of it that way. Such a simple way to screw people over lol. I'd like to believe they weren't out to get me that way, given the crazy times we're in, which those 2 back to back estimated reads were in the middle of.

The actual anniversary for my system is the end of July for true up. NJ law allows a one time reset which I did and was reset to March, though I've never received any official confirmation of the change, other than a .pdf file a rep typed up when I complained the second time. If my current 1.68MWh bank (expected to be ~2.5MWh in the bill coming in a few days) goes poof, I will know then that they're out to get me.

Understood.

If my bills were estimated, which I reiterate they are not, and if my understanding of how my POCO bills me is correct, if such estimates for any billing period were for higher usage than actually incurred for those billing periods, I'd guess (because I don't get estimated bills and so have no smoking gun to confirm my thinking) the actual and probably correct excess system production would show at trueup, but some of it would have already been paid for at retail rates.

If I used, say, 1,000 kWh for a billing period, but got an estimated bill for, say, 1,100 kWh, while having actual generation for that period of, say, 1,200 kWh for that period, I'd be billed for 100 extra kWh at retail rates for that (1,100 - 1,000) kWh, with 100 kWh called excess generation instead of 200 kWh of excess generation that would have showed if actual meter readings had been used.

Then, at trueup, assuming actual readings are used at that time, the total year's actual vs. estimated usage would be correct, and that 100 lost kWh (200 kWh-100 kWh) of excess generation would already have been (pre)paid for at retail rates and now (at trueup) reimbursed at wholesale rates.The POCO will pocket the difference between retail and wholesale for those 100 kWh. That amount would come from my pocket.

I wouldn't be surprised if your POCO has a way to account for this type of situation - it's too easy to spot with a bit of knowledge of billing policies - but I'd also not be surprised if they make less than no effort to make it easy to find and understand how it works. Having informed customers is never in a seller's best interests.

[njdealguy]

Understood.

If my bills were estimated, which I reiterate they are not, and if my understanding of how my POCO bills me is correct, if such estimates for any billing period were for higher usage than actually incurred for those billing periods, I'd guess (because I don't get estimated bills and so have no smoking gun to confirm my thinking) the actual and probably correct excess system production would show at trueup, but some of it would have already been paid for at retail rates.

If I used, say, 1,000 kWh for a billing period, but got an estimated bill for, say, 1,100 kWh, while having actual generation for that period of, say, 1,200 kWh for that period, I'd be billed for 100 extra kWh at retail rates for that (1,100 - 1,000) kWh, with 100 kWh called excess generation instead of 200 kWh of excess generation that would have showed if actual meter readings had been used.

Then, at trueup, assuming actual readings are used at that time, the total year's actual vs. estimated usage would be correct, and that 100 lost kWh (200 kWh-100 kWh) of excess generation would already have been (pre)paid for at retail rates and now (at trueup) reimbursed at wholesale rates.The POCO will pocket the difference between retail and wholesale for those 100 kWh. That amount would come from my pocket.

I wouldn't be surprised if your POCO has a way to account for this type of situation - it's too easy to spot with a bit of knowledge of billing policies - but I'd also not be surprised if they make less than no effort to make it easy to find and understand how it works. Having informed customers is never in a seller's best interests.

Might be time consuming and not that easy to dig through my POCO's terms and conditions fine print to figure out exactly how they handle this situation (And even some of their customer service reps may be clueless on this if I try to call them).

But my guess is what your saying makes sense and probably how majority of POCO's in this country would handle this situation where instead of refunding estimated power usage prepaid at retail rates they will instead adjust the banked usage in a later month on an actual meter read to be reimbursed at trueup at wholesale. For this I think its prudent to check each month's statement if usage was estimated and avoid paying for any estimated usage that is false. I did call yesterday to inform my current meter reading and my POCO PSE&G adjusted the month's bill with the corrected Net Metered balance.

[J.P.M.]

Might be time consuming and not that easy to dig through my POCO's terms and conditions fine print to figure out exactly how they handle this situation (And even some of their customer service reps may be clueless on this if I try to call them).

But my guess is what your saying makes sense and probably how majority of POCO's in this country would handle this situation where instead of refunding estimated power usage prepaid at retail rates they will instead adjust the banked usage in a later month on an actual meter read to be reimbursed at trueup at wholesale. For this I think its prudent to check each month's statement if usage was estimated and avoid paying for any estimated usage that is false. I did call yesterday to inform my current meter reading and my POCO PSE&G adjusted the month's bill with the corrected Net Metered balance.

I appreciate the time and effort required. Being retired, I've got more time than money and more money than brains to waste all 3 on fiddling w/ POCO billing ins/outs. However, I would certainly encourage you or anyone to get familiar w/their POCO's published billing policies and equally importantly, how those stated policies may actually work in ways that may be different than how any user may interpret them. Seems better than bitching in the dark about it anyway.

As for the accuracy of what I write being correct: I deem it to be so and present my opinions in good faith based on what I think I might know about my POCO's billing and tariff policies and reading my bills. But to reiterate, what I've written about the subject applies to what I believe my POCO's billing would do based on what I think I may know of such billing practices and as allowed by the CA PUC. The caveat there is that since I nor anyone I know on NEM with SDG & E has received a bill based on estimated usage, I may be wrong in what I write, but I've not seen, nor am I aware of any mechanism to change what I think would be the case if a bill came to me based on estimated rather than actual usage.

All of that aside, I'm pretty much completely ignorant of your POCO's billing policies and practices, so take all of what I write as perhaps interesting conversation and little else.

Not backing away from my opinion or what I wrote - just trying to put some perspective on it.