D.C. People's Counsel Requests Investigation of Horizon Power and Light

The District of Columbia Office of People's Counsel has requested that the D.C. PSC investigate a series of claims against Horizon Power and Light made by customers to OPC.

In a letter dated October 6, OPC reported that it, "has received numerous phone calls over the past three months from District of Columbia residential consumers, many of whom are senior citizens, complaining of aggressive telephone solicitations from apparent representatives of Horizon Power and Light ('Horizon Power'), an alternative energy supplier authorized by the Public Service Commission ('PSC' or 'Commission') to conduct business in the District."

"Specifically, D.C. residents complain that these Horizon Power representatives are stating that this company represents Pepco, and are asking for Pepco account numbers. Residents, particularly seniors, are further claiming that these representatives are aggressive in their efforts to obtain Pepco account numbers and in seeking agreement to switch to Horizon Power. In addition, these complainants have stated that the phone number provided to them by Horizon Power does not work," OPC said.

Based on these concerns, OPC said that it is "currently looking into this matter" and requested that the Commission investigate these claims as soon as possible.

Horizon Power filed a response with the PSC dated October 14, in which Jamie Rigell, President of Operations for Horizon, said that Horizon Power and Light, "does not and will not tolerate any type of misconduct from our representatives including any third party vendors we conduct business with."

Horizon offered full cooperation in addressing OPC's concerns.

Rigell documented Horizon's processes and quality assurance monitoring program, and reported that Horizon has in place a corrective action plan for any issues, which includes a removal/termination plan if improvements are not achieved. For example, if a sales agent is identified as providing inappropriate and or misleading information to a consumer, disciplinary actions and/or termination will occur.

Rigell reported that Horizon Power and Light began a D.C. sales campaign on July 15, 2011, and is still actively selling in the District of Columbia.

Between the dates of July 15, 2011 and October 14, 2011, Rigell said that Horizon has received a total of three consumer complaints from the Public Service Commission of the District of Columbia.

These complaints have been documented per the Commission's rules and responded to within the required response times.

Attaching prior correspondence from PSC Staff, Rigell noted that Staff has described Horizon's third party verification as "Extremely thorough" and as "one of the best" because it provides explanations, is not too fast, allows questions to be repeated, and because questions are spoken clearly.

Rigell also reported that in addition to the rescission period, Horizon Power and Light will not charge a penalty to a customer for canceling the contract until after a three month period.

"We do this to ensure a customer truly has adequate time to rectify or undo what they agreed to. There are times where customers forget they may be in a set contract with another supplier and we would hate for a customer to be charged a Termination Penalty by another supplier for any mistake made," Rigell said.