The Energy Services Regulatory Authority (ERSE) announced on Tuesday that it has imposed a fine of 200,000 euros on Petrogal for multiple offenses.
The offenses are related to the recording and storage of phone calls, non-payment of compensation to a customer, provision and dissemination of information to customers, incorrect configuration of billing elements, and failure to respond promptly to information requests made through call centers and complaint books,” stated a release from the sector regulator.
ERSE explains that “under the transaction procedure proposed by the company, within the scope of the Energy Sector Sanctioning Regime, acknowledging the facts, recognizing its negligent responsibility, its cooperation, the effective correction of the infractions, and the compensations Petrogal has already provided to customers, the ERSE Board of Directors accepted the Transaction Proposal, reducing the initial fine from 400,000 euros to 200,000 euros.”
“Notably, regarding the deleted call recordings, Petrogal has committed to resolving complaints in favor of customers when there is no other means of evidence to the contrary, acknowledging that this commitment could be used in consumer conflict arbitration,” ERSE explains.
According to the regulator, “the initiation of the sanctioning process followed Petrogal’s communication of an incident in 2023, which led to the permanent deletion, by an external service provider, of all call recordings older than 30 days in the contractual relationship with customers. ERSE initiated additional steps to ascertain the facts related to the incident, as well as the terms under which Petrogal executed its regulatory obligation to preserve recorded calls for three years.”
“Additionally, ERSE received from the National Entity for the Energy Sector (ENSE) a report indicating possible infractions by Petrogal, collected during an inspection of energy marketer activities in the market regime, as well as a set of complaint book pages, written in Petrogal’s complaint books, which were allegedly not sent, within the legally stipulated period, to the competent entity,” the regulator explains.
ERSE also notes that “on the other hand, an ERSE inspection of the electricity marketers invoices for Low Voltage Normal (BTN) customers, as well as consumer complaints filed against Petrogal, provided evidence indicating the practice of infractions by Petrogal.”
