Dear Colleagues –
 
Imagine paying your water and sewer bill on-time for years, only to receive a letter from your utility stating that – due to their error – you owe thousands in unpaid bills.  This is a reality faced by a number of my constituents. 
 
Existing law allows water and sewer providers under the jurisdiction of the PUC a four-year lookback window to recalculate consumer bills – even if the reason for the recalculation is an error by the utility.  Four years is a long time. 
 
Utilities need to clean up their billing practices.  It is ridiculous to reassess a customer’s bills 48 months after service was provided.
 
To address this issue, I will introduce legislation that reduces the lookback window from four years to one year.  This legislation protects consumers from years-old unexpected charges due to no fault of their own.  It will also, hopefully, encourage utilities to get their billing practices in order to ensure customers are being properly charged for services rendered. 
 
I would appreciate your support of this initiative.