COLUMBUS, Ohio — FirstEnergy lawsuit settlement payments have been coming out since the beginning of August, and some ratepayers feel they are being victimized twice due to how difficult it is to use the money.
"It's about as useless as a rubber beak on a woodpecker," said John Makley, a Cleveland FirstEnergy customer.
Makley only received $7.87 from the settlement but has been facing roadblocks in getting it.
At the beginning of the month, News 5 was the first to report that the payments were being sent out via a "sketchy" email link offering free money.
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He reached out to News 5's Morgan Trau to verify if the class action lawsuit was legit. She confirmed it was real.
But once going through the redemption process, he said it may as well be a scam.
"They just made the restrictions so tight, it's hard to spend it — I think that's a crime in itself," he said. "Do I have to launch my own class action lawsuit to get my money reimbursed in cash or something better?"
The money can only be used for online purchases. Makley is unable to deposit the money into a bank account or cash apps like Venmo. He also can't get cash from it. However, it can be added to a digital wallet like Apple Pay.
Makley found a loophole and was able to use the prepaid card to buy a gift card from Amazon — one he can add more money to.
Case Western Reserve University consumer protection law professor Cathy Lesser Mansfield explains that the card company is actually the winner in this situation, not the ratepayer who was already hurt by FirstEnergy. She received $8.15 from the settlement.
"You have to either find something that's exactly $8.15 or if you have a dollar left, I assume that's going to go back to the card issuer," Lesser Mansfield said.
After having the card for one year, the company has a monthly inactivity fee of $3.95.
"It eats itself in months 13, 14 and 15," she added.
Still, the attorneys from the lawsuit told News 5 that online payment is the best way to do this because checks are expensive to print and use up settlement dollars.
"My guess is consumers are gonna lose more money through unspent funds than would have been spent on sending checks which could be deposited," the professor responded.
The average amount a person gets from this settlement is $15, which Makley said makes this process even more frustrating.
When asked if he thought it was a waste of time, Makley gave a firm yes.
"It's wasted my time," he said. "It's wasting my wife's time trying to find something that she can buy with that amount, that paltry amount they sent us."
Lesser Mansfield added that consumers should pay attention to tax and shipping too, because it may look like there is the right amount of money, but people will be rejected if they don't have the exact amount or less.
About the settlement
Many Northeast Ohioans were included in a nearly $50 million settlement from FirstEnergy and Energy Harbor, FirstEnergy's former spin-off. Consumers sued the companies because FirstEnergy bribed lawmakers to pass a law benefiting them, which increased the price of their services.
This June, former House Speaker Larry Householder got 20 years in prison for his role in the state’s largest bribery scheme. He accepted a $61 million bribe from FirstEnergy and other utilities in exchange for a $1.3 billion bailout to help their struggling nuclear power plants.
This scandal was covered extensively by News 5, which followed the legislation all the way through the Statehouse, the arrests, trial, conviction and sentencing of Householder and former GOP leader Matt Borges.
Follow WEWS statehouse reporter Morgan Trau on Twitter and Facebook.
