Yes, the letter we are trying to figure out (we don’t want the smart meter, but can’t afford to opt out?@?) states you’ll be charged 75 PLUS a 10 per month fee on top of that- SUE THEM, you never asked to opt-in in the first place, who the heck are they to endanger us like that?

I read their letter, sent to me today listing the same charges you note on the bill- however, it reads somewhere in the middle of a paragraph, “if we haven’t heard from you (no due date) we’ll assume you want a smart meter and put one on your home.” I’d just pay, so they don’t put one on- we can all get together and sue them later, like Erin Brokovich when the brain tumors start killing everyone- did you check out the tree before/after pic? We were going to do an experiment, for fun awhile back, to show the same thing, because we were worried about surveillance & wifi systems in our home affecting Eukaryotic life (humans & plants!)- but now, we see very clearly our suspicions were correct. scary.

Redi:

Do you pay ‘online’? We do & have been checking almost daily for whatever response we might get from them regarding only paying our ‘usage’ , while
avoiding the ‘new’ (illegal) $75 opt-out fee last week. Being that we have an
online acct we can access it at any time & guess what? We just found an
additional $10 added to our $75 (=$85 now) the other day & showing due 6/20/12. By the way, because of having ‘online’, we rec’v our bill via email
usu the next day after the meter reading was performed.

I would say that you missed the many of my posts about SmartMeters, because I stress on the so called elimination of meter readers.
The sad fact is, there really is no way for PG&E to eliminate all the meter readers for a myriad of reasons, especially in Marin.
In Marin, PG&E is done with the electric and gas SmartMeter deployment and has eliminated 11 meter readers out of a staff of 22. But, the skeleton crew that is left is working overtime to take up the slack of PG&E eliminating half of their readers.
Some of the reasons are that: due to the topography, terrain, lush forested areas, low density and large parcels, the meters often are to far spread out to work with the radio SmartGrid mesh network. Another one is that the people who have E6/7 TOU meters for measuring the bi-directional flow of current fed back to the electrical power grid by solar and other customer generating system still need to have those meters read by a meter reader once a month.
So, there is no possible way that all the meter readers will ever be eliminated in Marin. Also, in my semi-rural area, we have a 36 percent refusal rate of SmartMeters, we never got them and never will now for sure.
And you are right about the durability of analog meters, I have had mine for 30 years, I was here when they installed it, never one problem with it. I talked briefly to my meter reader reader and he said they still have analog meters in service that are 80 years old, like the ones that only have 4 dials instead of 5.
It used to be that when U.S. corporations got contracts to manufacture meters for the utilities, they built their meters to last a hundred years and require little or no maintenance, but now, the exact opposite is true. Now, the meters are very cheaply made in foreign countries, built with planned obsolescence in mind and are forced on the customers for an expensive price to enable all the corporations and government officials to reap a windfall of profits.

Unfortunately there are millions being affected right now and don’t know the source. The smart meter is the “trojan horse” as it is killing people every day. All of us that are informed should be spreading the word as this is a clandestine invasion of America.
http://www.freedomadvocates.org/

I got billed $75 on my recent bill. For nothing more than what I’ve had for years. Yeah, makes perfect sense to Peevey.