The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power ranks poorly in customer service when compared to comparable utilities, and spends less in that area, according to study findings released Tuesday by Mayor Eric Garcetti’s office.
The study, conducted by PA Consulting, compared the operations and costs of the department against those of other utilities and concluded the DWP should increase spending on customer-focused programs.
Garcetti said the study highlighted the DWP’s customer service struggle, “reinforcing our work to hire 190 customer service representatives since April 2014 to drive call hold times down to under five minutes.”
“Under our new leadership at the DWP, we are changing the culture to focus more on customer service, because that’s what our customers deserve,” he said.
The study gave favorable rankings for the utility’s spending levels and reliability.
“I am very pleased with the initial results of this study, which will help us find and achieve real cost savings and greater efficiencies within LADWP’s operations,” said General Manager Marcie Edwards, who was hired about five months after the department rolled out a revamped billing system and started experiencing major problems.
The study has two more phases. The next phase will focus more closely on customer service, power distribution, energy loss and expenses that go uncollected. The third phase will look at ways to improve the DWP’s operations, such as cutting back on energy loss and uncollected expenses.
The study was released a week after a state audit found that the troubled 2013 rollout of DWP’s billing system could wind up costing ratepayers more than $200 million.
The system launch resulted in some customers receiving wildly inflated bills and others receiving no bills at all.
The state audit found that as of November, the utility was still trying to collect more than $681 million from customers for past-due bills. DWP officials said only about $245 million of that amount is attributable to the new billing system.
Councilman Felipe Fuentes introduced a motion today requesting that the state auditor and the DWP ratepayer advocate give reports to the City Council about the billing system’s problems.
He also asked the DWP to report on how soon the state auditor’s recommendations could be adopted.
“It is my expectation that the information revealed by the state audit and the ratepayer advocate’s analysis will continue to improve the management of the utility and restore the trust expected by our residents and ratepayers,” Fuentes said.
He added that residents and the City Council “are eager to get this matter resolved, once and for all, so we can finally focus our efforts on modernizing and maintaining our aging infrastructure to make room for a growing, robust Los Angeles.”
Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer announced earlier this month that his office filed a lawsuit against the accounting firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers, which the city hired to implement the DWP billing system.
Feuer alleges the company misrepresented its level of experience handling such a system, costing the city “millions” of dollars. But Daniel J. Thomasch, an attorney for PwC, called the lawsuit “meritless,” contending it was a “transparent attempt by the DWP to shift blame away” from the utility.
— City News Service