The Northern Territory's main electricity retailer disconnected a customer relying on life support machinery for several hours earlier this year.
Jacana has blamed a record-keeping error for the potentially fatal incident, which took place in February this year.
The blunder was brought to light in a recent report by the sector's regulator, the Utilities Commission, which reprimanded the retailer.
The customer was unharmed.
However, the commission's report detailed several other, less serious instances where a code of conduct intended to stop vulnerable life support customers from losing power was not followed.
"Any non-compliance with the life support provisions in the [Electricity Retail Support Code] is a serious matter as the failure to comply with these obligations could have detrimental and even fatal consequences," it warned.
Power disconnected for three-and-a-half hours
The code's provisions mandate strict record-keeping processes and additional protections for life support customers, defined as those who rely on ventilators, dialysis machines or any other devices medical professionals have said they need to live.
The commission's report said Jacana had received advice that a customer relying on one of those machines resided at the address in question.
But it said the company breached the code by failing to register the premises.
The reason for the disconnection, alongside some other details, were not disclosed in the report, and Jacana would not release them, citing privacy provisions.
However, the Utilities Commission said power was disconnected for almost three and a half hours.
"Jacana Energy advised that the customer was not harmed," a Utilities Commission spokesperson said.
The company reviewed its processes after the incident, hiring an external investigator to look into how the breach occurred.
But its subsequent investigations also uncovered a similar breach. In that case, according to the report, the company was alerted before proceeding with the disconnection.
While the commission said it did not accept or tolerate the breaches, it said Jacana took "appropriately targeted and timely steps" to prevent a repeat.
The retailer said that included:
- Temporarily halting residential disconnections for unpaid bills
- Communicating with employees about life support registration processes
- Improving its training processes, and
- Disciplinary action
Essential Services Minister Selena Uibo said she believed the matter was thoroughly investigated.
"I am confident that they have improved their processes to ensure that these incidents don't occur in the future," the minister wrote in a statement.
Jacana said it had implemented the recommendations of the external review, and had not reported any further breaches so far this financial year.
Several other breaches put lives at potential risk
The company also reported a further 16 instances where it did not provide life support declaration forms to customers within the appropriate five-day timeframe, in most cases because of system errors.
The network operator, Power and Water Corporation (PWC), was also reprimanded for failing to flag that three of its customers required life support equipment because registration processes were not followed when they moved address.
"PWC advised that there were no planned works during the period when the three customers were unregistered, but acknowledged that the customers were at risk during the time as their account did not have a life support status flag," the report said.
"That is, they did not have the security of notification of planned outages or procedures for unplanned notifications that are in place for life support customers."
The report said PWC had since reviewed and changed its processes.
Retailers have only been required to keep a register of life support patients from 2019, before which Jacana kept one voluntarily, according to the report.
A separate report from the commission recently found a growing number of residential customers in deeper and deeper levels of energy bill debt.
The average household bill debt was $971, up by more than $200 from the previous report.
