MEMBER FEEDBACK

By Heather Juzenas, Vice President of Marketing & Member Services

The Energy Cooperative partners with National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) to complete yearly member satisfaction surveys. The survey responses are sent to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI®), a company that measures customer satisfaction across multiple industries throughout the United States. For 2024, we received an ACSI® score of 84 (natural gas) and 80 (electric), on a 100-point scale. In addition to the scores, the survey report provides us with feedback and comments from our members. This valuable information helps me understand what we need to communicate better. Here are five things we want our members to know, based on common misconceptions we heard from this year’s ACSI® surveys.

WE ARE LOCAL

We have seven local employees dedicated to answering member phone calls on weekdays between 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. by calling 740-344-2102. Outside of those hours, we partner with the Cooperative Response Center (a third-party call center) that supports cooperatives nationwide. They have employees who answer the phones 24/7/365. When major outages happen in our region or around the country, you will notice that hold times increase. However, they are always available to speak with our members.

WE WILL CALL YOU BACK

When you call The Energy Cooperative, our member service representatives do their best to answer your questions. When we cannot answer them, we transfer you to the best person to help. For example, we transfer service issues to the supervisor of the appropriate department. Unlike our dedicated member services team, our operations employees are not always in their offices. When we transfer your call outside of member services, expect to leave a voicemail. Your call will be returned, but it may not be on the same day.

WE CAN TEXT YOU

We have the ability to send estimated restoration times to your mobile device. You can register for custom outage notifications on our website or by using the SmartHub app. Once you let us know how you would like to receive these messages, we will email and/or text you estimated restoration times during outages.

WE HAVE RENEWABLE ENERGY

Our electric generation comes from Buckeye Power, and their baseload generation comes from their state-of-the-art coal and natural gas-fired power plants. Buckeye Power also has a mix of renewable energy, including solar arrays in 24 locations across Ohio, biogas from anaerobic digesters at livestock farms, methane generation from the Hancock County Landfill, and hydropower from Niagara Falls.

The Energy Cooperative has a solar array in Utica, Ohio. We invite our electric members to lease solar panels and use the solar energy they produce. This is an easy way to get solar energy without the expense or maintenance of your installation.

We also have many members who connect their own renewable generation to our system. This is an excellent option for those wanting to invest in renewable energy. For small renewable generation systems, we credit members for power generated back to the grid through a “Net Billing” process. Our electric meters monitor the bidirectional flow of electricity to track when members consume electricity off the grid and when they generate electricity to the grid. The member is billed for the energy we supply, and we purchase excess generation from the member.

THE COST TO BRING YOU ENERGY

The monthly facility fee covers the cost of bringing electric, natural gas or propane to your home. This includes pipelines, poles, wires, substations, meters and more. The facility fee does not vary with your energy use. Whether you use a lot or a little energy each month, we must ensure the infrastructure is in place.

We work every day to bring value to our members and show you the cooperative difference. If you have feedback to share, you can send a message directly from our website www.myenergycoop. com/contact-us or give us a call.

*ACSI® is a registered trademark of the American Customer Satisfaction Index LLC. For more about the ACSI®, visit www.theacsi.org