Condo owners caught in the middle of a power bill power play
The William Oliver was Atlanta’s first Art Deco skyscraper.
Built in 1930 at the intersection of Peachtree Street and Five Points in Fairlie Poplar, the oldest remaining section of Atlanta’s central business district, the building ushered in Atlanta’s modern architectural era.
The red granite foundation, limestone shaft and decorative chevron and rosette details were designed by architect Francis Palmer Smith.
Named after the grandsons of Atlanta developer Thomas Healy, the William Oliver began as a commercial office building and converted to rental apartments for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. By 2001, the 115 units in the building were being sold as condominiums.
Owners were excited to own a piece of history — the building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places — but for some, that history has recently turned into a headache.
This summer, all three elevators in the 16-story building failed. A representative of the homeowner’s association who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the elevators, sourced and built in the 1920s, can’t easily or affordably be replaced. Even fixing them required parts from Germany and repairs were delayed when the parts were stuck at port because of tariffs.
The elevators are up and running again (for now) but another persistent issue in the almost 100-year-old building that requires more money and attention is the cost of electricity.
Over a year ago, I spoke with Gene Byce, an owner who purchased two condos in the building for his daughters when they were students at Georgia State University. He noticed that even though the units he owns are similar in size, the electricity bills were dramatically different.
The discrepancy was so large that he installed his own meters in the units and consulted his attorney. Byce shared emails with me in which the building management, the homeowner’s association and the utility management company, Utah-based Conservice, have acknowledged the problem, but offered no resolution.
“I call to complain to Conservice, and they say everything is fine and to take it up with the property management and the HOA. Then the property manager and the HOA tell me to take it up with Conservice. They are dancing around and sending me back and forth,” Byce said.
He now has a past due bill of $960 that keeps accruing late charges because he only pays for the usage as it shows on the meters he installed.
Byce isn’t the only owner experiencing billing errors. Some owners have overpaid hundreds of dollars. Other owners have managed to get inflated fees waived. But there seems to be no consistent resolution from one owner to the next.
When I have written about this issue in the past, I have blamed Conservice for a lack of transparency in billing. Locals from northwest Georgia to southeast Atlanta have contacted me over the past two years with similar complaints.
The company is facing several class action lawsuits in multiple states related to inflated billing but we are talking about the largest utility management company in the country with 5 million service points nationwide. This is the kind of mouse-elephant scenario that leads to a lot of frustration.
Unlike water, which by state law must be individually metered in multi-tenant dwellings, electricity can be master metered or submetered.
Bills for individual tenants are calculated with a formula that may use data from an energy monitoring system, the size of the unit and past history, according to the board member, who said members of the HOA board are equally frustrated.
It took six months for a representative of Conservice to visit the property to investigate, said the board member. The representative said the building’s energy monitoring system may not be sending the proper signals from sensors and meters installed on the property. So the property manager tracked down the manufacturer of the system, but that company said everything was working properly.
The HOA board has explored getting a new monitoring system installed but it would be expensive and not necessarily any more reliable.
They also considered returning to the days when they charged a flat fee to all residents, but that doesn’t fly with owners who minimize their electricity consumption. And they no longer have the staff to handle internal billing.
The board member said they would be happy to explore hiring a different utility billing company, but have not yet found a better option than Conservice.
The HOA is now considering putting individual electric meters in every unit so tenants can be directly billed by the utility but the cost would run in excess of $100,000.
HOA dues at William Oliver are among the lowest in the area, according to the board member. This has made it challenging to raise funds for upgrades or repairs through special assessments. Still, the board member acknowledged that residents are right to ask questions.
Georgia residents already have enough problems with high electricity bills because of rate hikes to cover the cost of nuclear power Plant Vogtle, higher fuel costs, and new data centers.
What they don’t need is billing errors and a game of subterfuge to make it worse.
Read more on the Real Life blog (www.ajc.com/opinion/real-life-blog/) and find Nedra on Facebook (www.facebook.com/AJCRealLifeColumn) and X (@nrhoneajc) or email her at nedra.rhone@ajc.com.
About the Author
Nedra Rhone is a lifestyle columnist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution where she has been a reporter since 2006. A graduate of Columbia University School of Journalism, she enjoys writing about the people, places and events that define metro Atlanta.
