And this is done not by an undisciplined consumer, but by an entire supplier company. And the court, in the name of Ukraine and on the basis of the law, blesses this deception.
Where should one go to complain to a person who has been charged a hundred thousand hryvnia in debt if he simply does not have that kind of money? Not to mention the feeling of complete injustice that the state gave him during the war.
Below is the story of a small man's struggle against a big company.
Procurement in a new way
A new era of relations between electric power companies and their subscribers began in Ukraine on January 1, 2019 - electricity supplies were divided into two processes: distribution and... again, supplies. Distribution was given to the so-called distribution system operators (DSOs) - these are the same regional power companies as before, but the so-called energy supply companies (ES) began to deal with “supplies in a new way”. True, they do not supply electricity in the literal sense of the word (as oblenergos did before), they formally buy it on the market and formally sell it to subscribers, but in reality they only collect money for electricity.
At the same time, the lion's share goes to the distribution system operators, for example, in the Kyiv region, DTEK Kyiv Regional Electric Grids received 81% of the payment amount in January of this year. (Well, 19% commission for electric utilities is very good!) At the same time, energy supply companies do not control or even take meter readings, do not print or send out receipts, the subscriber must do this himself - take and transmit the readings of his meter. If he suddenly did not do this, then the indicator is determined by “calculation”, which will be discussed in detail below.
It is worth noting that, for example, in the USA, one cable goes into a house or apartment, but as many as three companies can supply electricity under different conditions, and they compete for the subscriber. Why don't we have this? The answer is simple: there is no retail electricity market in Ukraine. Although there are a lot of supplying companies, due to the regulated (fixed) price, there can be no talk of any competition. It is possible to write and approve the Rules for the retail electricity market (which the National Commission, which carries out state regulation in the fields of energy and utilities, copied from the EU), but this does not automatically create a market.
Why did NEURC, through a whole series of regulations, create an institute of energy supply companies, very similar, frankly speaking, to a “gasket”?
It is clear that when ordinary regional power companies turned into OSR, they transferred all their subscribers to the EC. This transfer took place quietly and without unnecessary ceremony: the new suppliers published a standard agreement on their websites and stated that this is an adhesion agreement, that is, it cannot be abandoned and changes cannot be made either. The only thing you can do is take a supplier from another area, but what's the point? The price is the same for everyone, at that time – 0.90/1.68 UAH. So, all the rural grandmothers and city grandfathers, having read the agreement on their computers and smartphones, unanimously joined and “moved” from one lord to another. Like serfs.
Everything would be fine, but the trick is different: it would be logical to record the meter readings as of January 1, 2019. However, for the supplying companies this would have been unnecessary trouble, and they did not do it (apparently, they had other reasons), and as for the subscribers, then, of course, no one could even think about it. But in vain. Over time, it turned out that some of them had huge debts to new suppliers. Where did they come from?
How DTEK meters work
Subscriber A (last name hidden, but the case is real), arriving at a rural house in winter, found a piece of paper in the gate (see add. 1) - the spine of a shutdown order and cut electrical wires. The debt was indicated on the counterfoil - 96,084 UAH and the date - 01/22/2020. Needless to say, he did not receive any warnings about the debt or about a possible shutdown, although this is provided for by the Rules of the retail electricity market established by NEURC. The subscriber caused a scandal, and the power supply was restored, but the debt did not disappear; moreover, it grew!
The payment slip as of January 31, 2020 (see add. 2) indicated a debt of 102,427 UAH - in a few days (without wires!) another 6 thousand UAH miraculously “ran up.” However, these are not all miracles; on the screenshot from the website of the supplier PrJSC Kyivoblenergo (see add. 3) it was then highlighted that in January of the previous year 2019, subscriber A consumed 19 thousand kWh, in February - 18 thousand kW -h, and in March – more than 7 thousand kWh. This directly contradicted the laws of physics known from school - the meter simply cannot increase such indicators even with round-the-clock maximum consumption.
Subscriber A contacted DTEK Kyiv Regional Electric Grids to check the meter, maybe it was faulty, but it turned out to be working. Then the subscriber wrote a statement to DTEK with a request to cancel these fantastic indicators, and he agreed to pay off the rest. The application was considered by a special commission consisting of representatives of NEURC, State Energy Supervision and other specialists. On the day of the meeting, electricity consumption indicators on the website of the “Kyiv Regional Energy Supply Company” (KOEC) disappeared, and the commission recorded in its minutes (see add. 4) quite “decent” indicators: for January - 536 kWh, for February - 425 kWh, but for March - an “indecent” 51,904 kWh! A very respected and highly qualified commission decided that everything was correct. In other words, the counter can count up, if not 19 thousand, then 51.9 thousand.
Pinned “to an electric pole” by circumstances, subscriber A decided to enter into a debt restructuring agreement, as recommended by the DTEK commission, and at the same time resolve the issue of the amount of debt. Why? Because he was afraid that he would be “cut off” and trusted the word of the company. He applied to the Kyiv Regional Energy Supply Company with a corresponding application for restructuring for a period of 60 months (which was proposed in the KOEC agreement form), and at the request of KOEC, he also submitted a certificate of income. But the company thought about it and... refused. The subscriber submitted a second application - for 36 months. The company thought about it and... refused again. When the subscriber submitted a third application, the company representative replied: “Kyiv has agreed on seven months for you.” And she directly hinted at the wire cutters. Although the monthly payment exceeded the subscriber’s pension seven times (!), he... signed the agreement, but the next day he went to court. In the lawsuit, he asked the court to cancel the clearly unlawful part of the debt and set a feasible deadline for restructuring.
How does the Kiev-Svyatoshinsky district court work?
The faith of subscriber A, inexperienced in litigation, in the laws of physics, common sense and elementary justice turned out to be, as events showed, naive. The Kiev-Svyatoshinsky District Court, represented by its chairman Tatiana Dubas, after lengthy sessions, made a “logical” decision: if subscriber A signed a restructuring agreement, it means he recognized the amount of the debt. Dot. And from this it follows that the meter can still generate 51.9 thousand kWh per month!
In desperation, subscriber A turned to the same Kiev-Svyatoshinsky district court with a demand to terminate this ill-fated contract. And there were a number of reasons for this, provided for by the Civil Code of Ukraine - the lack of free expression of the parties’ will, the agreement’s non-compliance with the requirements of reasonableness and fairness, the presence of pressure, that is, the threat of a power outage. Judge Natalya Pinkevich made a decision that is worth quoting: “Freedom of contract is also manifested in the opportunity given to the parties to determine the terms of such an agreement” and “The plaintiff’s reference to the fact that the restructuring agreement was concluded by him under coercion and pressure through threats of power outage... the court does not take into account.” Could Judge Pinkevich have decided the case contrary to the previous decision of the chairman of this very court? That's the question.
Meanwhile, the Kiev Regional Energy Supply Company did not sit idle. While the first case was dragging on in the Kiev-Svyatoshinsky District Court, KOEC prepared a claim for debt collection from subscriber A and filed it at the place of registration of subscriber A - to the Svyatoshinsky Court of Kyiv. At the same time, the director of the company, Svetlana Sokhatyuk, signing the statement of claim, asked the court to consider the case “without calling the parties,” that is, on the sly, so that subscriber A would not know about this claim. And then, lo and behold, the executive service will simply arrest and sell his car or apartment and return the disputed debt. Fortunately for subscriber A, the court decided to consider the case according to the usual procedure, and when it learned that another trial was ongoing in this case at the same time, it stopped the hearing until it was over.
How DTEK calculates debts
When the first legal battle reached the Kyiv Court of Appeal, one circumstance became clear that no one had paid attention to before. In the protocol of the DTEK commission on page 3 (see add. 4) it is written in black and white: “On October 27, 2018, a representative of the Company (PJSC Kyivoblenergo. - A.S.) recorded a display of 32,000, on December 10, 2018, a representative of the Company recorded a display of 42,253.” . And further: “As of 12/31/2018, the consumer did not provide the actual indicator of the metering device, therefore, the determination of the final display 14052 as of 12/31/2018 was carried out in accordance with the provisions of PRREE and KKO.” Do you feel the logic of DTEK’s thinking? The meter showed first 32 thousand, then 42 thousand, and then... 14 thousand kWh. However, this “logic” did not raise any doubts among the panel of judges consisting of Yashchuk T.I., Malakhai L.D. and Nemirovskaya O.V., and she decided that the debt was accrued correctly. Well, absurd sequences are logical only in one case - when the court itself is in a state of absurdity.
What are these magical abbreviations PRREE and KKO, before which the venerable judges' robes bowed? These are the Rules of the Retail Electricity Market and the Code of Commercial Electricity Metering, which establish the calculation method for determining the meter indicator. How? Just like in school - they take the difference between two actually established indicators, divide by the number of days between them and thus determine the average daily electricity consumption. Then the indicator for the desired date is determined from it. If you carry out these simple calculations with the indicators as of October 27 and December 10, 2018, it turns out that as of December 31, 2018 (that is, as of January 1, 2019), the meter reading was 47,146 kWh. Consequently, the claims of DTEK and KOEC were exaggerated by 47,146 – 14,052 = 33,094 kWh, and if in money (UAH 1.68 each), then this is UAH 55,597.92. It turns out that DTEK may be deceived by the meter, and the court will uphold the legality of this deception.
Is it possible to win a trial against Akhmetov?
The biggest problem of the old oblenergos was that, by law, they could not collect debts for more than three years. In addition, they were saddled with various bad debts - bankrupt, liquidated enterprises and others. But if you transfer them en masse to new “supply” companies like KOEC, which do not record either the terms or origin of debts, but only their size, then you can scatter them “on your own and on others” as you like - the computer is at hand! Now it becomes clear why supply companies were not eager to record meter readings as of January 1, 2019. Of course, the vast majority of subscribers meticulously monitor the readings, but the terrible Russian-Ukrainian war tore millions of people away from their homes and meters, so after their return (give God!) home the incident with subscriber A instead of exotic can turn into everyday. Because the entire Ukrainian system of relations between consumers and providers - be it electricity supply, be it utilities, be it legal proceedings - is built on the “modern principle of Al Capone”: people can be robbed without a gun – with just a “kind word”. Suspension of the case in endless appeals.
