JOSEPH N. BELL -- The Bell Curve

That boxed explanation for the absence of a column last week was no

joke. I’m laughing with tears in my eyes -- and a new layer of irritation

at the people who keep pushing for deregulation. How many disasters will

it take in which the consumer -- and usually the small consumer -- ends

up picking up the tab before we admit that in many instances, maybe most,

deregulation is a terrible idea?

I got involved in one of those instances last week -- a lot more

involved than I cared to be. It started with the arrival of my monthly

bill from Southern California Edison in mid-February. When I opened it, I

thought they had me confused with one of the local industries.

Micro-Bell, maybe. Or Bell Laboratories. My electric bill was $582.31,

which a credit from Edison brought down to 429.66. That’s what was in the

slot that said: “Your account’s balance due by 3/6/01.”

First, some background. When electricity was being offered up like

bagels or gold-mining stock, I was inundated -- as I’m sure you were too

-- with promotional pieces telling me why I should ditch Edison for some

other supplier of electricity. I was curious enough to look at most of

these pitches and discard them, but one caught my eye. It was something

called Powergreen, and they wanted me to switch to them because they

alleged they were more sensitive to environmental considerations in their

operations.

I called them and was assured there would be no difference in my

electric bill. I would pay the same, and the environment would benefit.

Because I had no great love for Edison, I bought into it. And although

credits began to show up on my bill several months later, they were

small, and I didn’t pay proper attention to them until the November bill

arrived. It was significantly less than usual, and was followed by a

December bill that showed only a sizable credit in my balance due box.

This is where I screwed up. Because we devoutly wish for things like

this to happen because we are good people and always pay up on time, I

assumed I had inadvertently overpaid my previous bill, or perhaps paid it

twice, and my friends at Edison -- which was still billing me in spite of

my defection to another company -- were doing the honorable thing by me.

I should have called Edison then, but I didn’t. I just enjoyed what

seemed to be my good fortune.

And then the January electric bill arrived in mid-February. It

contained three months of billing by something called the Powersource

Corp., which I assume fronted for Powergreen. I was charged $151 for

November, $191 for January, and $307 for December. That surely made the

one string of lights I had over my garage door the most expensive

decoration this side of Las Vegas.

Once the shock had passed, I spent much of the rest of the week on the

telephone, which, next to answering telemarketing calls, has to be the

world’s least desirable way to spend one’s time. Live voices are hard to

come by at corporations these days, and live voices that can respond to

questions not on the list in front of them are a rare quantity, indeed --

especially at the Powersource Corp.

Edison turned out to be both more accessible and tractable, although

it took three calls to get past my anger and the feeling that I was

hopelessly lost in an energy maze. As best I can sum up what I learned,

if I had stayed at Edison, my bills would have been about 40% less than

the Powersource billing. And the credit appearing on my bill reflected

Edison’s obligation to make up the difference between what Powersource

charged Edison and what Public Utility Commission regulations allowed

Edison to bill me. So Powersource got fat while Edison and I picked up

the tab.

Getting information from Powersource was agony. After long waits, I

would get people who simply couldn’t deal with such questions as why I

wasn’t billed when I should have been in November and December, and what

they planned to do about adjusting what I allegedly owed them. Had I been

properly billed, I would have changed back to Edison after the first

excessive bill and not been stuck with the others. When I repeatedly

asked for a supervisor, my call was switched to a machine that told me to

leave a number and I would be called. I never was.

After three days of this, I told the first person I reached that I had

been shuffled around enough and that I wanted her to stay on the line

until I was talking to a supervisor. So I got one, only to be told that

the delayed billing was caused by computer problems and there was nothing

they could do about adjusting my bill. Tough luck, Charley. So I told her

I wanted as far away from Powersource as possible, and she asked me,

apparently in all seriousness, if I would tell her why I was changing so

she could fill out her report.

Two days later, I read in the Los Angeles Times that the managers of

California’s electricity grid, the Independent System Operator, had

released findings that in January alone the cost of nearly two-thirds of

the electricity purchased for Californians was “excessive.” The Federal

Energy Regulatory Commission called it “unjust and unreasonable.” The ISO

is asking the feds to order the gougers to grant refunds.

I’m ready. They can reach me at the Pilot.

Meanwhile, maybe we should take a longer look at the first cousin of

deregulation: privatizing, which has a mythic ring to it in this country.

Both deregulation and privatizing are anchored in the assumption that

given complete freedom in the marketplace, entrepreneurs will act in the

public interest. Before we privatize Social Security, we need to ask

which poses the greater danger, bureaucracy or greed? And maybe take a

hard look at our electric bill before we answer.

* JOSEPH N. BELL is a resident of Santa Ana Heights. His column

appears Thursdays.