Sheffield councillor brands Northern Powergrid “extremely poor” over compensation claims for power cuts misery

Coun Tom Hunt says he has been frustrated by Northern Powergrid’s actions following the power cuts in August. Around 2,000 households and businesses repeatedly lost power after a fire at an electricity sub-station hit main power cables serving Upperthorpe, Lower Walkley and Langsett.

Coun Hunt said that some people’s compensation claims had been knocked back by the company because their power was restored just short of the 12-hour point where households are eligible for compensation – some by a couple of minutes.

He said he had questioned this because people suffered from repeated power cuts but was told the rules are not flexible. “Through that week the power was going on and off- some people had five to six power cuts,” said Coun Hunt.

“Some were only half an hour but the stress people felt from not knowing whether it was going to go off again was quite disturbing for them.”

Huge generators had to be brought in to provide temporary power as engineers worked to get the problem fixed but there were problems with some of these as well. The company said some outages were caused when people tampered with the generators.

‘No reminder’

Coun Hunt said that Northern Powergrid told him that only 145 people were eligible for compensation. He has found out that 45 are still waiting for a payment but the company would not tell him who they were because of data protection laws.

He also believes that the firm has not done enough to inform people of their rights: “They sent one letter out back in August, no reminder and nothing more proactive apart from that. That’s really poor.

“£100 is a drop in the ocean for a company owned by Warren Buffett, the fifth richest man in the world – £100 for people in Upperthorpe, Langsett and Walkley is a lot of money, especially when bills are rising, prices are increasing and people had to throw out the contents of their freezers.”

Coun Hunt added: “I don’t want anyone to miss out. I sent out my own letter to 1,500 properties to encourage then to get in touch with Northern Powergrid and check if they are eligible. Within those will be those 45 people.

“I’m just frustrated that here is a company which communicated poorly with people last year and has made very little effort to get in touch with people to make sure that they get the money that they are entitled to.”

His letter to residents called the company’s response “extremely poor”, adding: “Like many of you, I was very unimpressed by Northern Powergrid and I still am. I pressed them to make goodwill payments to people who had multiple short power cuts.

‘Don’t lose out’

“They say they can’t and can only pay compensation for people who have lost power for over 12 hours. But they’ve not even done that.”

He advised constituents: “£100 is a lot of money and I don’t want anyone to lose out. To make a claim call Northern Powergrid on 105. It’s free from landlines and mobiles.”

He invited people to contact him with questions or to get advice.

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