My most recent encounter happened just a few months ago. Although it wasn’t about getting electricity for a new business, I thought my case is a good reflection of how the company operates and treats its customers.
One day, my electricity to my flat was simply cut. It was a Thursday, my busiest day at work. I had received a warning that somehow I owed money to Kyivenergo, despite paying my bills monthly and having ample proof. But it’s not even the cutting off itself that left the nasty aftertaste, it’s what happened next.
To get hooked up again, you have to go through a few circles of hell in Kyivenergo, which is owned by DTEK, the energy holding of Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest man. The concept of customer service is clearly still alien there, and private ownership has not yet been able to fix it.
To start the process of getting the power back, I had to travel to Kyivenergo with a stack of documents, including three years’ worth of paid bills, the current meter readings and proof of property ownership. Needless to say, it took a trip home to collect all those, and another one to deliver them to Kyivenego’s customer service office.
And then, I was in for a nasty surprise. The office, which handles a few million customers, only has two to three managers working at the time. And guess what? The queues to get into their office are long. Very long. People come prepared, carrying iPads and newspapers to read to pass the hours of time waiting in a hall for their turn.
When it was finally my turn, angry and tired, the first thing I got there was a lecture from the manager about the importance of paying on time and in full. Not a smiley tut-tut sort of lecture, but a nasty, full-scale telling off.
Thing is, until that day I actually thought I was doing alright with payments. But it turned out that I did not fill out the form properly, and for the past two years I underpaid a few bucks on every energy bill.
Interestingly, there is a company inspector who shows up at my door about every other month to take her own meter readings, and Kyivenergo actually keeps all the alternative calculations for every customer and knows quickly if there is a problem of this kind.
For two years, it said nothing about my debt, but one day – boom! – instead of calling me to fix it, they cut me off. And by the way, the agreement under which Kyivenergo provides me with services was three years out of date. They did not bother to fix it. Actually, despite the fact that the company makes money off me and other customers, the lady manager told me the outdated agreement was my problem.
It got merrier still. The lady printed out a new bill for me to pay – for hooking me up to the grid again. I had to pay it a state bank, and deliver the proof payment to the customer service department by hand – after waiting in the queue once again. Only then would they put me into the schedule to restore electricity in my home.
By the time I paid, the working day ended. I spent a lovely candlelit night at home, and arrived at Kyvienergo’s door again first thing in the morning. I was lucky because the queue was shorter – just under 1.5 hours. But since I delivered my proof of payment after 10 a.m., the company could no longer put me up on the schedule on the same day. So, I was up for at least another candlelit night without electricity.
In total, it took me three visits to get all my documents up to date with Kyivenergo, with many hours wasted in the queues. My story is not unique. When chatting to a member of parliament recently, I heard an almost identical story about Kyivenergo’s service. The deputy, who represents the pro-presidential Party of Regions – Akhmetov’s political force – at one point was even about to have a word with the multibillionaire owner. I, on the other hand, tried to call the hotline 15-88 (or +380-44-202-15-88) if you’re using a mobile phone. I did not get a response once.
While I queued in the hall of Kyivenergo right next to the door that claimed to house the call center, I realized why I could not get through. There was only one operator servicing all those millions of Kyivans trying to get help, and she had no qualms about leaving her office frequently during her working hours.
Kyiv Post deputy chief editor Katya Gorchinskaya can be reached at [email protected]
