Beware Of Online Bill Paying

If you thought that customer service at BGE couldn’t get any worse, you lost that bet. We have discovered a horrible Catch-22 with their online bill paying process. If you pay your BGE bill online through your bank and close or change the account, BGE has no method to resume billing you for their services.

If you sign up to pay online via BGE and their website and continue to do so, you are fine. However, if you make even one payment through your banking institution, it presents another problem. Apparently when an electronic payment is made from your bank, BGE automatically sends all future notifications of bills electronically to the bank. When you close an account, your bank has no interest in communicating with you to let you know you have a bill due; yet BGE still sends them notifications.

When contacted, BGE incredibly said they had no way to send out their own bills and it needed to be handled by the bank. When we contacted the bank, Wachovia Bank, they said they had no way to control what BGE sends to them–rightfully so.

When contacted again, BGE reiterated that there is no way they can resume sending bills in the mail. However, when the account becomes significantly past due, they will mail out a turn-off notice. Does this make sense to anyone? Does this make you feel comfortable? They have the technological capabilities to send turn-off notices, but not regular bills?

When contacted a third time to verify the information, we were told that we could always go online to BGE.com and view a bill. It is a nice theory, but how many people are sitting around watching YouTube and decide to pop over to BGE.com just on the off chance they posted a new bill?

BGE is in dire need of some serious customer service training. Can anyone name a single company that is unable to send a customer a bill for services provided? How many people has this affected in Maryland? Where is the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC)? With the coming changes in the banking industry and the runaway fees from most major banks, many people are indeed making changes.

If you can’t recall the last BGE bill you received, you may be caught in this catch-22. Beware!