Jersey Central Power & Light Review

Recently, at the end of February, I received an invoice from this company that included not only the current statement, but also seven others dating back to the beginning of 2023. These reports were combined with additional charges for late payment. The company representative explained that on February 2, my bank requested some payments back (7 in total) and they would not remove the fine. The second representative confirmed my payment history and said that yes, the payment was made on time, but the bank only requested these payments after 10 months. Overall, this situation is confusing. I recommend that the company review their billing process to avoid similar issues in the future. The worrying thing is that even though my bank has confirmed that they haven't reversed any payments, the company insists that they have. Additionally, I didn't receive any notifications or feedback through the app, which I usually rely on to pay my bills. It seems unusual that my balance was not carried over to the next month, as is usually the case if a payment is missed. When I asked for the late payment fee to be waived, the company refused, citing an alleged bank reversal, which I believe is inaccurate. This situation has left me frustrated and frustrated with how the company handles billing discrepancies. I asked to speak with the manager and was told that he would call back. Without waiting, I called again and the assistant said that the manager called and left a message. It's a lie!! It seems to me that the company is making extra money by adding these fees - it's a complete scam.

This company is a mess. There is no other explanation. The servicing of electricity should be taken away from them and given to PSEG.

I'm a new customer and called customer service to transfer account. 10 minutes gone I'm still listening to the countless BS advertisements. Unbelievable! And in the end the system said the number I shall call has changed! Astonishingly terrible!

This company is totally irresponsible There are any of their utility poles bent and hanging over Broad Street in Red Bank. I am sure that their engineering specification for pole installation does not include having poles hanging over the curb and onto the streets. I was denied a claim with our any indication that there was any kind of field visit to the location in question. I wish that I could giver 0 stars. I will be talking to the Board of Utilities and to the Asbury Park Press to address this dangerous situation where poles are bent and hanging over the curb and street.

I dont know how an electric company can get away with customers speaking to customer service representative and being told times power would be back on and following a web page with different information as well. This seems unfair and unprofessional. Why even answer the call if you can not give correct information? You need to rethink your customer service!

If there was 0 stars I would give it. THE WORST COMPANY I HAVE EVER DEALT WITH. They turned my electric off becase the old Tennant owed money. I have been here for 4 months and never received a bill. HOW IS THAT MT FAULT ? So I call to get it back on, and they refuse to come out for another day. MIND YOU I have a boyfriend who lives with me who is diabetic and I need to keep his insulin in the refrigerator or it goes bad. I asked the representative what to do and know her answer? CALL 911. ARE YOU JOKING ?!??!?!?! Not to mention they hung up on me THREE TIMES. Oh I'm sorry I'm very upset that your will not adhere to a medical need , your brilliant advice is to call 911. OH, and to be transferred to a manager ?? "A few hours and someone will call." NOT TO MENTION the 45 minutes I spent on the phone with them, 35 of it being on hold . If you're moving an apartment complex or a home where this is your provider , think again. DO NOT USEE THIS COMPANY , ESPECIALLY IF YOU HAVE SPECIAL MEDICAL NEEDS, THEY DO NOT CARE.

Worst power company. They switch power off or over on normal business days and have no care whatsoever for the temporary brown out condition that occurs. Someone should do a study on the stresses and damage this causes to all of our micro controlled appliances, let alone our tvs.

Since we have a water well pump, we get automated phone calls advising we take precautions--any time a minor rainstorm is forecasted. Why don't you fix your power infrastructure instead?

I keep garbage and trash clean off my property, but anytime their service rep comes to read my monthly power usage, I ALWAYS find gum wrappers or cigarette butts carelessly dropped along the path to the meter afterwards. I'll eventually catch this activity on video one day and file a formal complaint.

First storm of the '19 season in Sussex County ... power has been out for over 40 hrs, expected repairs by Dec 5th!

Power is always out. Getting to be a once a week. Restoration times are never accurate. Customer service is lousy.

Why so much money ? We pay every month close to $1000 for a house of 2 hard working people, we have no internet, no children, we unplug everything , our water heater is set to 120, we cook 2 times a week, all lights are off in all rooms unless we are in the room which is the master bedroom. What is going on? I can't take it anymore . I lived in jersey city in New York, in Florida, I never paid so much money before, I had ch I'll Loren before living with me , I used to pay the most in winter and summer is $200 .
HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
PLE

This company is full of incompetent employees.
Lazy and dishonest.
They do not read the meter using excuses like: bad weather; dogs, etc. when the weather is good and its no dog in the actual property where they are suppose to be reading the meter,
Also they charge an estimate bill base on can not figure out what.
How one person in a house for several hours a day can use $300 dollars in electric during the month of January? when is not AC operating?
I send the company every month a $50 dollar payment during the winter time and $100 during the summer time and they are cutting my service because my bill is over due! How can that be possible?

They are the electric service provider as to what NJTRANSIT is to mass transportation. This is the worst company in NJ. #SUCKS beyond belief. -5 stars if I could.

Wow, so many bad reviews. And all this medical stuff and they shut off my electricity is just fake. Dont even try. Trust the local guides.Been with them 10-15 yrs in 3 different home, never a problem. Through sandy, ice storms, thunder storms, substation issues and the whole nine yards. Remember YOU ARE NOT THE ONLY ONE HERE! They are responsible for MOST if not ALL of New Jersey.

Worst company ever!!! DO NOT USE!!!! There should be a 0 starts!!!

No power for 8 days now and not even on the outage grid! What century are we in? All my wires are underground so what s the problem? Jcp&l claims will get to the 1st outages 1st. I know for a fact that s not happening .jcp&l will repair larger neighborhoods 1st to improve their repair numbers. Poor service, no one to speak to, very frustrating.

Trying to call in a continuous brown out and after answering some questions the computer voice tells you it will connect you to someone and the phone just crackles but you can hear voices speaking but can't understand what they are saying. 3 tries now. Really? I've already lost appliances due to brown out conditions trying to avoid it happening again.

Wish a zero star option was available because that is what JCP&L deserves. Their customer service department is a complete joke, every interaction I have had with them over the years has been awful.
Customer service ... they might as well call it customer abuse because that is how you are treated.
Typical monopolistic attitude and the BPU lets them get away with it!

They knew there was a storm, they knew that it s gonna be bad, still they don t have enough crew members to look into issues- the whole street seems to be recovered and still they are telling me that it might take 2 more days to fix the issue as after 2 days of research they don t even know what the issue is....no regular updates......very pathetic company ... do not understand the state of mind of people without power from past 2 days

I had a billing/account question, I was very clear about the problem I was having.
The representative said I don t have time for this and hung up on me.
I have never experienced a company treat their customers this way.
They can get away with it because it s a monopoly.
I wish I could give 0 stars.

Unstable power, automated voice recognition system is terrible for reporting outage after hours, just terrible

Poor but expensive service and if you lose power, forget about it. In the middle of a pandemic, we ve been without power for more than 24 hours and they haven t even dispatched anyone yet! Awful.

Power is out multiple times in the year for what seems like no reason. Even if they claim it's due to weather, I can fully expect to be out for over 4 hours for drizzle. I lived in pseg territory for over 25 years and never experienced so many outages. JCPL is ridiculous, they should be paying their customers.

Customer Service was excellent, very patient and polite. Thank you.
Una M.

Just brought a house in High Bridge and they charged me $652.00 to start service. They said it s for a deposit and I could get it back after a year of good payments. I asked why so much money and she said it s two months of the average monthly payment for that house based on the previous owners. I have never herd of such a thing with PSE&G.

There should be negative stars for this company. Absolutely shameful

Equipment is made out of cheese. Slightest change in the weather and power is out. Horrific service, horrific engineers and I ve never experienced as many outages as with this lot. Seriously, check if this company will be your provider before you move. I would avoid the area entirely if this is your electric company. How are you in business....

Horrific experience with these guys once again! I cannot imagine a worse company than this, every time there is an issue they are overwhelmed and not prepared. Cavalier attitude when you call to complain, even have the audacity to be rude when their service is disastrous, totally incompetent service.... absolutely unbelievable they continue to keep the contract for northern NJ.

I have never in my life been forced to talk to a company with poorer customer service. They make mistakes and ruin lives and no one cares. They are rude and do nothing but interrupt you during the call.

Literally the worst.one star is too generous. No other options in the area and if you need your power serviced after business hours you re SOL. I miss PSEG.

I am so pissed off that I'm stuck with this SCUMBAG utility company JCP&L, the people that work in customer service are useless pieces of garbage, I can only hope and pray that some day PSE&G buys out JCP&L and every single last JCP&L employees is fired. They should act and conduct themselves like the PSE&G customer service. JCP&L is not even in the same league as PSE&G...

Have been living in the area for 7 years and the jcpl service has been the worst . When power goes out it often goes out for days and not hours. As a result everyone in the area has a generator becasue we lose power so often and for so long .

Only gave one star because I had too. They are HORRIBLE during storms! Not the lineman, the management! You knew back to back storms were coming for days and do NOTHING! And the outage map is a complete farce. And they get to do it because they have a monopoly over most parts on NNJ. Disgusting. Sorry if my payment will be late this month. I pay on your website and have no power. For days. In winter.

Worst repeonse to a storm that I have ever seen. It's been 29 hours now since we first lost power here in Morristown and they just recently dispatched a team to clear the trees off the power lines. Most of Elm Street seems to still be without power. I expect a much more timely response to a significant power issue. I am quite let down by this company and their inefficient response to a storm. Would hate to see their response to a hurricane.

Horrible service power goes out n you can't find out why no way to talk to a real person they suck big time

Saw power company truck road reopened Park Avenue Randolph still no power

It really bums me out that a company of this size and responsibility is able to operate like this in the United States.

Their customer service is always great!. have had to deal with them several times and always walked away very happy!

This utility is so poorly managed, 10 negative stars.
Worst call in help in the history of robo assistants. Beyond pathetic.

Horrible company what a disgrace power goes out all the time. Worst company ever litteraly needs to go out of business.

This is the worst company I've ever experienced. Ever since moving out of Bergen County, which hardly ever growing up lost power, we lose power if it rains or light winds here. Its ridiculous also that we are one of the only nations in the stone age without underground wiring! I grew up in Italy that has had phone and electricity under ground for more than 50 years! This is the 22nd century? They'd rather pocket the money at our expense than modernize anything. This should be the first company to begin moving towards this since it's in the most rural areas full of trees. If there's ever a real disaster, we are screwed.

How is it they have less customers than pse&g but have double the customers without power lost power twice in a week but still mo priority put on getting our power back

Everytime long term power outages company that's experienced in PA, Mountains, Trees, Ohio but can't handle NJ. Experiences words can't describe. Torture, Scary as well knowing loved ones, anyone to have this company. It's time for upgrades and different company, seems its on purpose & shows as they waste time purposely to make money. They shut power for non pay instant and maybe if all of us customers send nothing all winter they'll get out NJ. After all, PSEG is all around and a switch away.

Charged $366 dollars just to start service! I've never heard of such a thing. Just moved to the area and I've always had PSEG and they NEVER charged me that much for anything, period. Customer service can use some training as well. I hope I don't experience the outages they seem to be famous for......

This criticism is not of their service which has been satisfactory. It is of their automated response system. Hire humans or implement better tech.

Are you kidding? This company can not keep the power on when someone sneezes in tiusville,NJ. COMMUNICATION IS NOT TRUE EVER IN AN OUTAGE.

I have 2 live wires down on my driveway. I am trapped in my house with a severe heart condition. So far it has been over 3 hrs. and no response from JCP&L. How terrible is that!

With no power again, no time frame for fixing it , I call it Jersey Central Power Limited!

Horrible. lost power with below freezing temperatures outside, customer service advised they would not come out until the following day.

Would give zero stars but not possible. Should be shut down immediately

It is hard to believe how a Utility company responsible for maintaining the electric grid in many towns in NJ has an 8am to 6pm customer service phone number and no weekend service. Most of us are at work during week and need help over weekend.

My power went out and I called their emergency number. They told me it was a customer service call and I had to call the next morning. Even Con Ed, which isn t that great, has 24 hour service. The girl on the line told me to have a good night. I told her I hope so. Terrible.

Worst company ever ! I made registration to make payment on website and somehow the system does not accept my registration. I left messages and called them 3 times and no answer!
What kind of management they do have ?
Is there an official government number to complain about those issues ?
Pleas help !

I'd rather run on a hamster wheel all day and power my house myself than deal with this disaster of a company.

Mount Olive township. Many more interruptions and outages than we had years ago. Penny wise pound foolish company. I see the diseased trees and the leaning trees over electrical wires. YOU HAVE BLINDERS ON!?$

Reading some of these reviews. Man what a bunch of spoiled people you all are. You do realize there was an ice storm followed by a major snowstorm don't you? Ice = water = HEAVY. The snowstorm was over 2' in some places. Trees down all over the place - including many largel ones. What EXACTLY did you expect this company do about all the trees coming down? Grow up people they are doing the best then can. sheeeeeeeeez you make all Americans look like spoiled brats. Suck it up for a few days.

Awful customer service, poor infrastructure. Frequent and lengthy power outages seemingly for no reason

Well.. Outages are getting quite frequent in my area

No need for a storm to power, it just goes out and the price goes up

Most outages and poor repair turnaround. Rude customer service. Dont have capapility to be a utility compang for meeting key infrastructure needs. No accountability

So I sent a check out to JCP&L on March21st, on March 28th my electricity was shut off. I called to figure out why this occured since I sent them a check ( attached to the check was also a tracking number). They said they never received the check and that there was no information regarding a check sent to their facility. I explained to them that I have not received a bill for March, much less a shut off notice. They brushed that statement off, and continue to tell me that I would have to pay all these crazy fees in order to have my electric turned back on. I explained again that they have in their possession a doctor's note stating that I have a disabled child who requires a breathing machine 4 times a day, which is electric. They said that I would need to require a new note from the doctor and within 24 hrs of them receiving that note they would then turn my electric back on. Making this short, I tracked the check, which was indeed in their facility and went there myself with the information from the tracking number and behold, the check magically appear at their facility! Within 2 hours, my electricity was turned back on...total joke this place is. $200.00 dollars worth of food in the garbage and two night hotel stay because these idiots can't keep track of payments.

Terrible service. No one to talk to about power outage. Only an automated message with no clear update about the situation. For the love of God we are clearly in the 21st century.

WORST POWER COMPANY EVER!!!!!! If you can find an alternative, you should absolutely do so. And then when you have proms with these people they are closed or don't answer the phone. Power outages constantly

Just because it is not possible to give this company 0 stars. They are extremely inhumane!

With out power for 4 days now. Drove by to see repair crews on their cell phones, having coffee.... all day

We and a large number of homes in our Indian Lake neighborhood suffered lengthy power failures throughout this afternoon and evening, July 19, 2020.

JCPL was totally unavailable for us to reach by telephone or over the internet. Even when I attempted to view the JCPL website on my iPhone, I was greeted by the following: Website unavailable.

To me, this unexplained power failure was just an inconvenience, but for people whom depend upon electronic medical equipment to function in their homes, such a power failure could be fatal!

I am disgusted that JCP&L executives could allow a several hour power failure to occur, with no explanation or time estimate for repair to be available to their customers!

I hope that my formal complaint will be accompanied by complaints from many others, and will hopefully get the attention of JCPL management.

I reported a power outage via JCPL automated line. Very easy and simple. Got a follow up text that power will be restored in 2 hours and subsequently two other texts indicating further delays to restoration of power with the last text indicating 6 pm restoration that same day. No power and no updates until the next morning that power will be restored by 11:30 am followed by another update that power will be restored by 11:30 pm for most customers in the area. Why bother sending these texts if you can't deliver? Waste of my time and data plan.

Update.. still not happy... they sent me a wrong bill. Did not have to pay it...but still horrible customer service.

Horrible customer service , I called customer service to apply for Electricity Account , they could not verify my SSN (Every other service provider could verify) so they asked me to come in person with ID card to their nearest office which is 1.5 hrs from my office , I took half day off to go there , office timings are till 4:00 pm (not available on weekends) and i reached there at 3:40 and the gaurd said they all left by 3:30 . I called customer service again to let them know they said we have no control over their timing so please go again and get verified.

I'm only rating 1 star because I have to, Customer Service Representative was SO RUDE. I believe her name was Nancy. She was so miserable. Did nothing whatsoever to help me out because she didn't know the answer to my question. Made me feel stupid for even asking a question.

poor customer service.. poor performance.. outages are common..

This is how JCP&L treats its customers. When we went to check my grandmother s house on Friday morning, this is what we found. They had lost power and a transformer needed to be repaired. It was done in a timely manner, however we were not even informed that the work was going to be done. This Hickory Nut tree was butchered with huge limbs left all over the driveway. You could not even fit a car between them, let alone an ambulance or emergency vehicle. And if you tried to drive a car through it you would have driven over the very sharp and splintered ends.

JCP&L informed us that they would not remove the tree limbs from our property, even though JCP&L damaged these limbs without our consent, or even our knowledge. The state they left both the driveway and the tree in was completely unacceptable. It took five-plus man hours of clean up and the tree will require attention from a professional. Because they hacked the ends of limbs off and the remaining trimmed limbs were left from three to six feet long, the tree is in danger of dying as well.

JCP&L pretended to care about my complaint on Facebook and I received a call from the forestry department. I appreciated that the gentleman had come to look at the tree and offer his opinion (that it would still need further trimming) but he held the party line that they do not clean up debris when linemen do the (unskilled) trimming. I could not even SHAME an apology out of him.

So be wary and watchful or your trees could be butchered like this, leaving you with hundreds of dollars of avoidable damages and cleanup.

Our power goes out just in our small neighborhood all the time and it s not because of any weather events. There are issues somewhere that they can t seem to fix.

Horrible... been out of power for hours now... they sent one truck with one person... was told the other was on their way ..... that was an hour ago ....

Called up customer service to ask basic questions on when my power would be restored. The rep's name was Daniel.

"Hello, I'd like to know when my power would be restored because it has been over 48 hours since we have had power, and we live on a mountain where it is 10 degrees colder than the average in Jersey. My father is 63 and it is too late to make arrangements to stay at a hotel, they're all booked up.

"You should call 911." Then he hangs up.

I think we really need to split up JCP&L into different companies and have them compete against each other for better service. Investors would back them up because the business provides a constant stream of revenue.

Also, we still don't have power. Possibly until March 7th. We lost power on March 2nd.

My husband is in the military and we just moved our newborn baby to the area. We were only able to be at the house for two days and tried setting up our electric. This company is TERRIBLE! The temperature was over 90 degrees and they refused to turn our power on. We had a newborn baby is the house and told them and they said they couldn't do anything. They were the ones to accidentally turn off our power too. If you can use another company, I highly recommend you do! They don't even deserve one star.

Lost power and they have done nothing to fix it. I feel like they don t care. I want to charge them for all my food now

My experience to contact Jersey Central Power and light is a poor 1 out of 10. I just wanted to pay a bill and it has been impossible to for them to get me to the credit department to pay the bill. I have spent about 2 hours to get this resolved. So far no luck. I should change my rating to zero.

Honestly terrible service in every way. Can wait until they get replaced by a larger company. They have awful customer service, poor response time, and lie about the time estimated until it turns back on. They are also closed during their normal hours of operation. They are poorly coordinated and managed.

Last one to get power thanks. Everyone I know gets it before me. My power line isn t that severe! Thanks for really helping me out.

How lousy can a utility company be. Just look at JCP&l. The worst.

The worst managed corporation ever. Power outage since 24 hours. There is a JCPL van standing for last 8 hours just waiting for line technicians to come. He has no ETA when they would arrive. Call the company - they will not be able to tell you -WHEN. No visibility, no accountability - classic problems of a monopoly market. I am pretty sure while we are suffering without power the senior company officials are saying - "don't worry about customer complaints - they'll forget soon and will not wake up until the next thunderstorm".

Hey mr/ms CEO - do you even have a feel of how your people are serving your customers??? Do you have a few mins to engage with your consumers? Would love it if you respond.

Worst company I have ever had to deal with. Their should be an investigation put on the way they prepare for storms.

Wow somebody put 5 stars? Amazing! This company doesn't deserve even 1 star - any minor wind and service is down... I'm sure in 21 century job can be done much better.
Update : Here we go again - a foot of snow and service is down. Within 1 week two major outages... Sometime I feel like I'm in Stone Age

Pseg should buy jcpl....it's really an embarrassment how they handle this recent storm. The only trucks I see are parked or eating at the diner..OT milking at its best.....haven't seen one working in my area yet....I'm being told over a week before a chance for power. They also say they read my meter monthly....had a camera there last 4 months....nobody even near my meter.....that will be addressed soon. Whoever runs jcpl....hang it up....your useless. Everybody contact the BPU and make a complaint....hit them where it hurts.

This company is very bad. We lost power for three days and they were not able to provide clear answers...They just put cones on the streets where the damages occurred and did noting to repair the damages. VERY FRUSTRATING

Worst experience. We are not having power from past 3 days and they dont know when it will be restored. Would never never suggest anyone JCPL.

Called this company and they came at night to "fix" the transformer accross the street because it wasn't enough of an emergency to come during the day. A year later my cable guy says that the transformer is giving off 5amps and if messed with will set my house on fire. I called the company AGAIN at 9am and they didn't care enough to do an emergency ticket until I called at 4:45pm where I got carol telling me that she would not call dispatch and kept feeding me the same line as the employee before her. Then magically she was able to call dispatch and (being in the service field when I was younger, I know the drill) was given the copy paste line of "we have the order we donno when we can make it out" and wanted to give it to me. After assuring her that if she REALLY cared to ask then she would have actually gotten an eta but no, she didn't want to do that either. So now my "emergency ticket" that was placed at 9am on Friday is being bumped to the midnight shift on a holiday weekend. This company needs to work on their relationship between their customer service reps and their dispatching departments. As a supervisor she didn't even know what time the dispatcher shift change was! How? Just how do they function over there?