Kristin Harriger lives on a budget, typically setting aside about $100 for her monthly electric bill. This month, in what she thought at first was a joke, she opened her electric bill to a stunning $1,381,783.92 balance.
"I opened it. I read it. Then just went, 'Oh, my gosh. That's a lot of money'," Harriger told the Abilene Reporter News. The Texas native texted pictures of the bill around to friends, and called her utility company – Potentia Energy – to have a new bill sent to her with the right balance.
According to Business Insider, Potentia miscalculated her bill by epic proportions. Its normal rate is $0.09 per kilowatt hour, but they charged her $1,000 per kwh. At most, according to The Public Utility Commission of Texas website PowerToChoose.org, the highest rate a resident of Abilene could expect to pay is $0.12 per kwh.
“When Ms. Harriger informed us of the erroneous bill, we responded within five minutes and assured her that we would rectify the situation, which is what we have done,” external affairs officer Sehr Charania told Business Insider. Harriger was promised a new, correct bill, within in two days. Two weeks later, she still does not have the new bill, but said she had set aside $150 to cover it whenever it arrives.
