Director of Customer Assistance
Julie Ford-Williams is Director of Customer Assistance at the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities.
The PUF team was warmly welcomed by those energy stalwarts charged with drafting and implementing Governor Phil Murphy's Energy Master Plan at the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities.
It's serious work, but it's fun too, as you will hear Staff attest. And the New Jersey BPU is big, with some two hundred and twenty-five Staff, because in 2003 it established the Office of Clean Energy to help administer its programs. Talk about forward thinking.
PUF: What is your role here at the Board?
Julie Ford-Williams: I'm Director of the Division of Customer Assistance. Often, we are the first front end contact that most people have with the Board. We handle customer complaints regarding electric, gas, water, and some telephone.
We keep service going for citizens of the State of New Jersey, for people who are trying to pay their bills, having hardships, service problems, or issues with reaching out to the utilities. Not everyone knows how to talk utility jargon.
They can't understand everything the utilities are saying to them, since they may have never been in this situation before, so we're their mediators. We're the negotiator of billing arrangements, payment arrangements, if they can't get their service turned on in time, are buying a new house, and issues like that.
PUF: How many people are in your department and how is work divided up?