Customers Compensated for NW Natural Fiasco

Posted on October 23, 2026 by Charlotte Shuff
Tags, General Interest, Energy

Kid celebrating win as Dad shows something exciting on phone

Last year, after pressure from legislators, Oregon’s six largest state-regulated utilities agreed to a voluntary pause on disconnections for many low-income and medically vulnerable customers through the rest of 2025. But NW Natural failed in its attempt to implement the agreement and shut off nearly 200 of these protected households who were behind on their bills.

They broke their promise to protect the most vulnerable Oregonians.

NW Natural shut off some families during the promised disconnection pause for owing as little as $50.

When we learned about this fiasco, CUB called for NW Natural to make things right with customers. We were able to work out an agreement with the gas utility and other advocates to compensate the customers who were harmed during this year’s heating season. Starting this November, all of the wrongfully disconnected customers will receive benefits from NW Natural— including up to $1,550 in additional bill discounts. While nothing can fully make up for what families had to endure, this is a step in the right direction.

The agreement with NW Natural will also add additional protections for all customers, not just those impacted by the wrongful disconnections. Overall, a big win from a bad situation!

Wrongfully Disconnected Customers See New Relief

Starting November 1, 2026, going through March 31, 2027, customers who were wrongfully shut off last winter will receive new temporary benefits from NW Natural.

New 2026-2027 Winter Bill Discounts
Impacted customers will see temporary additional bill discounts, with amounts broken into four tiers, depending on the length of the wrongful disconnection. These discounts will be split into five monthly chunks and spread across bills this fall and winter for each family.

Tier 1 (0-1 days disconnected) = $66 total ($13.18 for 5 months)
Tier 2 (2-7 days) = $135 ($29.97 for 5 months)
Tier 3 (8-30 days) = $465 ($92.92 for 5 months)
Tier 4 (31-79 days) = $1,558 ($311.67 for 5 months)

Past Due Bills Paid Off
NW Natural will pay for any past-due bills (arrearages) over 30 days old as of March 31, 2026. This includes any additional amounts impacted customers paid back from the date of wrongful disconnection through March 31, 2026. This will show up as a credit on a customer bill.

Returning Relief Grant Funding
Some of the customers who were wrongfully shut off may have used NW Natural’s arrearage relief grants after losing service. Qualifying household customers are able to access $1,000 over 24 months. If any impacted customers used these funds, NW Natural will make these grants available to be used in the future.

Additional Benefits:

NW Natural will not charge any customers for any costs related to the payments or benefits credited to impacted customers.
If any of the impacted customers leave the gas system (moving, stopping service, etc.), NW Natural will put the money owed into relief funds available to other qualifying customers.
All impacted customers will be refunded reconnection fees and costs paid to reconnect from the wrongful disconnection.

Lasting New Protections for All Customers

While nothing will truly ever make up for shutting off heat during the winter for families, part of this agreement will help protect future customers from losing life-saving utilities. Now, NW Natural has new policies for what can trigger a disconnection.

For customers on payment plans, NW Natural had long begun the shutoff process when a household was just $50 behind on bills. Now, these customers can receive a shutoff notice only when they are $150 or more past due. This is in line with other utility practices.

Customers Will Be Notified if They Are Entitled to Benefits

All of these benefits will be automatically applied for any customer who was wrongfully disconnected last winter. NW Natural will send a letter and include a bill message for impacted customers. Each credit will show up on the bill itself as a line item (ex: “Credit 1 of 5”) for each qualifying month’s bill. There is no action needed to receive these credits.

After March 2027, for those who are still enrolled in the bill discount program, discounts will go back to normal based on income tier.

Background: The 2025 Winter Shutoff Fiasco

From mid-November through December 2025, PGE, Pacific Power, Idaho Power, Avista, Cascade, and NW Natural agreed to pause disconnections for households with low incomes who receive monthly bill discounts or anyone who had a medical certificate.

These important, but limited, protections came on the heels of the longest government shutdown in US history. The shutdown delayed the distribution of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) funds. These public programs help keep low-income Oregonians fed and connected to power. Additionally, during this time, many changes to federal social safety nets and other negative federal actions worsened energy security.

But during this entire period, NW Natural continued to disconnect protected customers. Between November and December 2025, the gas utility shut off 198 customers who qualified for protection against disconnections.

How Did NW Natural Allow Wrongful Shutoffs to Happen?

On February 12th, CUB was assessing 2025 disconnection data from NW Natural and noticed a big problem. There were bill discount program customers disconnected in November and December, even though there were supposed to be protections in place. We immediately jumped into action to figure out what happened and reached out to the utility. A week later, NW Natural’s Vice President of Regulatory Affairs and Resource Planning contacted CUB’s Executive Director, Bob Jenks, to inform him of the Company’s error.

In formal responses to CUB’s requests for information, NW Natural stated to regulators that it “discovered that we did not implement the voluntary temporary winter disconnect moratorium for bill discount programs as intended.” It further noted that “processes were in place to do so.” The mistake was made due to an “internal miscommunication.”

CUB called for action to make things right with customers. While the situation was dire, we are hopeful that this situation will not repeat itself in the future. We appreciate NW Natural working to further support these impacted families this coming winter.

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