SDG&E Summer Relief Fund Call-In Capacity Expanded; Fund Now Exceeds $450,000; Additional Telephone Number, 619/542-7405, Open Seven Days a Week

Business Wire, July 31, 2000

Business Editors

SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 31, 2000

San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) today announced that an additional agency telephone number has been set up for callers requesting information about the Summer Utility Relief Fund. Low- and fixed-income customers may now call 619/542-7405 from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. weekdays and from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

The fund, which is being administered in conjunction with the United Way and Catholic Charities, is for customers with low or fixed incomes, or who are experiencing a temporary financial hardship that makes them unable to pay their bills, such as a serious family illness or job loss. The fund is designed to pay half of a customer's bill, with a maximum benefit of $100.

SDG&E and its parent company, Sempra Energy, launched the Summer Utility Relief Fund July 20 with $100,000 in seed money from corporate funds. Since then, the relief fund has received pledges from electricity market participants that raise the total to more than $450,000. To encourage future contributions, SDG&E and Sempra Energy have pledged an additional $1 in corporate funding for every $4 the market participants contribute.

"By increasing capacity to handle inquiries about the Summer Utility Relief Fund, we hope that this fund can get help quickly to the people who need it most in San Diego and southern Orange counties," said Pam Fair, vice president of customer services for SDG&E. "The market participants' donations to the fund are encouraging, and will help expand the options available to provide some much-needed relief from high electricity prices from the California Power Exchange."

Fair added that she hopes more power generators and marketers contribute to the fund, both to demonstrate their community commitment and because they are deriving increased profits from the higher electricity prices SDG&E customers are paying.

The United Way will continue to handle some requests for assistance from the fund as one of many programs available through its INFO LINE; however, the 619/542-7405 number is dedicated exclusively to the Summer Utility Relief Fund.

"The United Way supported SDG&E with its INFO LINE to help the utility put this program into action quickly and help customers as soon as possible," said Sara Matta, director of information and referral for the United Way in San Diego. "We believe that this new telephone line will help alleviate our heavy call volumes and make the process much smoother for customers in need."

The company also said that 10 new service representatives have been added to handle high call volumes and assistance is available in Spanish.

Agency call center personnel assess each customer's needs and match them with appropriate nonprofit agencies that can provide help. Qualified customers are referred to participating nonprofit organizations that issue vouchers that customers can submit to SDG&E for payment of a portion of their gas and electric bills. Catholic Charities acts as the program's fiscal agent, paying the funds to SDG&E on behalf of customers.

In California's newly created competitive energy marketplace, SDG&E is a delivery-service provider. For those customers who have not chosen another energy service provider, SDG&E buys electricity from the California Power Exchange (Cal-PX) and passes that cost directly onto its customers, with no mark-up. The price of power is now a function of supply and demand in the open market. Over the last several weeks, SDG&E customers have seen their electric bills rise sharply due to the significant increase in commodity costs as a result of power demand in California and surrounding states.

The establishment of the Summer Utility Relief Fund marks the latest in a series of actions SDG&E has taken recently to help customers grapple with high electricity prices.

On July 24, SDG&E announced it had requested that the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) authorize the utility to spend $16 million over the next two years to increase funding for energy-efficiency programs. The money would be used to help replace old, inefficient appliances, such as air conditioners and refrigerators, which will result in reduced electric bills and less strain on California's electric-supply system.

On July 20, SDG&E and the Cal-PX proposed a new market-based power bidding solution to the CPUC that would allow SDG&E to procure power for customers with less price volatility over the next five to nine months.

On July 14, SDG&E filed a request with the CPUC to accelerate the return of $100 million in customer money from a CPUC-controlled account. The CPUC's approval of SDG&E's request would release of money acquired from power-generating benefits from San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station and other assets to decrease the August and September residential electric bills by $34, or $17 a month.

San Diego Gas & Electric is a public utility that provides service to 3 million consumers through 1.2 million electric meters and 740,000 natural gas meters in San Diego and southern Orange counties. SDG&E is a subsidiary of Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE), a Fortune 500 energy services holding company based in San Diego.