7,900 Complaints Received About Hydro One: Ontario Ombudsman

This article was last updated on April 16, 2022

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According to a recent release of stats by the Ontario’s ombudsman, it was confirmed that the office received a record high number of complaints over the past year with Hydro One’s billing practices. Andre Marin confirmed that more than 7,900 complaints were received about Hydro One, which is the most his office has ever received about a single government agency.

The annual report released on Monday revealed that almost all complaints criticized the provincial utility’s billing practices. It was explained that “unintelligible billing … to lack of metre readings, to malfunctioning smart metres, to people’s whose homes have completely burned down and they’re still getting hydro bills, which is my favourite one.” During the news conference on Monday morning, it was pointed out that the investigation into Hydro One is the largest systemic one to date. The report also highlighted that one complainant had almost $8,000 taken from her bank account because Hydro One alleged that it made mistakes on her previous invoices for almost two years.

In addition to that, the report confirmed that the ombudsman’s staff is meeting with executives at Hydro One to work on the issues. Marin alleged that “we have already seen the agency accept blame for problems and begin to fix existing system failures.” On the other hand, the report also said that the investigation into unlicensed daycares is due to be released this summer. A previous report by the ombudsman’s office confirmed that it received a record 26,999 complaints last year, up 37 per cent from 2012-2013.