Lee County woman seeks to receive, pay FPL bill to avoid later surprises

What happens if your power is on, but the electricity company says your balance has been $0 for almost three months? One Lee county woman doesn’t want to find out and is battling to get and pay her Florida Power & Light bill.

Cynthia Taylor hasn’t seen an FPL bill since October 2022.

“This is the last one I received, so I haven’t gotten November, December, or one for January,” Taylor said. “I always pay the whole amount, and my electricity has never been shut off or nothing like that.”

Taylor says it all started with Hurricane Ian. She didn’t have power for almost two weeks afterward, but when her electricity came back on, FPL didn’t bill her.

“I was raised to pay my bills,” Taylor said. “So, every month, I pay my bills out, the whole amount. Whatever it’d be, I pay it.”

Taylor called FPL multiple times, and each time she was told she didn’t have a balance. One representative even told her the meter was changed.

“It’s not working; you don’t see no numbers on here,” Taylor said of her meter. “No numbers.”

All Taylor wants to do is pay for the utility she’s using.

“I just want to stay on track,” Taylor said. “At the end, you may think you’re getting away with something… then it might harm you worse because you’re thinking you’re getting away. And I’m not gonna do that.”

WINK News emailed FPL asking if someone from the company would fix Taylor’s meter and send her a bill. FPL says it got in touch with her but could not say much else. Instead, WINK News got an update from Taylor.

“I got a call that same afternoon. I had been calling them like, what, three or four or five times and no response back. When you stepped in, it was like, right, yeah. So, I appreciate you,” Taylor said.

The meter was finally fixed.

“I was excited after they came out because I got some peace and rest,” Taylor said. “I was able to sleep throughout the night again because I was just tossing and turning.”

Taylor’s past electricity bills rarely went above $150, so she doesn’t expect to pay more than $450 for the missing months. She still has not been billed, however, and is not due for the upcoming month yet.