TU’S POWER TRIP: WATT A DEAL!

the numbers game Back in July of 1987, frank French, then-vice president of Dallas/Fort Worth Medical Center in Grand Prairie, commissioned an electric utility audit of the hospital. French was shocked when the audit revealed that TU Electric had overcharged D/FW more than $100,000 since 1982 for electricity to a new wing of the hospital.

Easy to fix? No. Three years later, D/FW Medical Center has yet to receive its refund. “TU Electric is trying to weasel out of paying us,” says French, who is now president of USA P.R.I.D.E.

The problem stems from a contract the hospital signed with TU in 1982 agreeing to pay half of the contracted electric load of 1,500 kilowatts a month. For the next five years, however, the hospital used only between 278 and 320 kilowatts a month in the new wing. The difference cost D/FW more than $3,000 a month for almost five years. Ironically, hospital officials later learned that under state law, the contract was never necessary.

Due to a backlog of rate increase cases before the Public Utilities Commission, a decision in the case could be another year in coming. In the meantime, D/FW has filed a lawsuit under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and could receive triple damages if it wins.

“The hospital overestimated its electricity needs,” says TU spokesman jim Lawrence. “It’s not our fault they made a mistake.”