Southern California Edison

Complaints & Reviews on USAComplaints

USAComplaints currently maintains 18 historical complaints about Southern California Edison, published between 2005 and 2012. No approved complaints have been published on this site during the last three years. For a current reputation snapshot, see the independent sources below.

• DiscriminationPublished Dec 30, 2012 · Historical consumer allegation
• Consumer ReportPublished Jul 9, 2012 · Historical consumer allegation
• So Cal Edison, SCE Edison illegally transferred my sister's outstanding balance to my accountPublished May 4, 2012 · Historical consumer allegation
• Unfair Edison Rate HikePublished Nov 9, 2011 · Historical consumer allegation
• SCE — Fraudulent Returned Check ChargesPublished Aug 17, 2011 · Historical consumer allegation
• My daughter moved out of her apartment on Sept 1 and was charged for electric at this residence for several months while other tennants occuppied this residence.internetPublished Jul 18, 2011 · Historical consumer allegation
• Outrageous $701 bill... Edison says it must have been estimated, sometimes meters aren't actually read!Published Jan 7, 2011 · Historical consumer allegation
• SCE Another Viictim of the SCE MonopolyPublished Dec 16, 2010 · Historical consumer allegation
• Electric bill never goes down even when all power in home is at minimumPublished Nov 8, 2010 · Historical consumer allegation
• Racket - ELECTRICPublished Oct 15, 2010 · Historical consumer allegation
• EIX, SCE, Edison InternationPublished May 31, 2010 · Historical consumer allegation
• SCE Sue these guysPublished May 19, 2010 · Historical consumer allegation
• Did not help!Published Dec 26, 2009 · Historical consumer allegation
• Over chargePublished Aug 19, 2009 · Historical consumer allegation
• Getting the run around on updating my credit reportPublished Jun 8, 2008 · Historical consumer allegation
• Don't work weekends even for emergency turn onPublished Apr 4, 2008 · Historical consumer allegation
• Making me pay for last roomates overdue billPublished Apr 26, 2007 · Historical consumer allegation
• Closed my account without my knowledge or consent RipoffPublished Jul 15, 2005 · Historical consumer allegation

Complaint Themes

Each tag reflects a complaint's single primary theme (not every angle it raised), and complaints outside any problem theme — a positive report, or one later retracted by its author — aren't tagged. Counts may total less than the full complaint count above.

Independent Sources

Shown for context — not merged with USAComplaints' own numbers.

Contacts

• SCE official website: https://www.sce.com/
• Customer service (residential): 1-800-284-2365
• Business customer accounts: 1-800-990-7788 2 complaints mention this number
• Report an outage: 1-800-611-1911
• Claims help (non-Eaton Fire): 1-800-251-3311
• Claims department (non-Eaton Fire): [email protected]
• Eaton Fire program in-person help: 1-888-912-8528
• BBB-listed number; also a dial link on SCE support page: 1-800-655-4555 3 complaints mention this number

Locations

Southern California Edison customers: contact, billing disputes, claims and where to complain (checked October 11, 2026)

Southern California Edison (SCE) delivers electricity to customers in its Southern California service area and is regulated by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC). The steps below follow SCE's own pages and CPUC pages opened on October 11, 2026.

Who to call. SCE's customer support page lists Customer Service at 1-800-284-2365, Business Customer Accounts at 1-800-990-7788, and 1-800-611-1911 to report an outage. Keep the date, time and name or ID of each representative, and your account number. CPUC advises customers to give the utility the first chance to resolve a billing or service problem and to keep a record of each contact.

If the bill looks wrong. CPUC says to contact the utility directly about what you are billed for, bill explanations, payment arrangements and starting or cancelling service. CPUC's FAQ says that if a utility cannot read a meter it estimates usage from the same period of the previous year and corrects the bill when it can read the meter, and that the customer is told if bills are estimated for more than 3 months in a row. SCE's Billing & Payment page also lists a Budget Billing Plan, which it describes as paying for annual service in 11 equal monthly payments that 'does not reduce the amount of your bill', and payment help under 'Financial Assistance'.

Disconnection and deposits. CPUC's FAQ states that before disconnecting, a utility must give a 15-day written notice stating the reason, the amount to pay and the earliest disconnection date, followed by a second notice at least 48 hours before; that disconnections may not occur on a weekend or legal holiday unless there is a safety issue; and that for electric and gas utilities a residential deposit cannot be more than two times the average monthly bill. If service is in jeopardy of being disconnected, CPUC's Consumer Affairs Branch asks you to call 1-800-649-7570.

If SCE does not resolve it. File an informal complaint with the CPUC Consumer Affairs Branch: online at the CPUC 'Utility Complaint' page, by phone at 1-800-649-7570 (Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.), by fax at 1-415-703-1158, or by mail to 505 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94102-3298. CPUC says its caseworkers 'interact with the utilities to attempt to resolve any problems'. A formal complaint is a separate process CPUC describes on its website.

Damage or loss claims. For property damage, food loss or other losses a customer attributes to SCE, SCE's claims page says claims can be filed online, by email ([email protected]), fax or mail (P.O. Box 900, Rosemead, CA 91770), with help at 1-800-251-3311. SCE says its goal is to decide most claims within 30 days, that it is generally responsible for losses 'due to our negligence' and generally not for outages from causes outside its control (see its Tariff Rule 14), that denied claims may be taken to civil court including small claims, and that the statutes of limitation it lists are 3 years for property damage and 2 years for bodily injury. The CPUC 'does not rule on the merits of individual claims', according to SCE's page.

Eaton Fire claims. SCE directs Eaton Fire claims to a separate Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program (see the regulator and litigation sections below); its FAQ states a claim deadline of November 30, 2026.

Regulators and investigations: CPUC, Safety and Enforcement Division and wildfire matters

The facts below come from the Edison International and SCE joint Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 (filed July 30, 2026), which is the company's own SEC disclosure, from an August 4, 2026 Los Angeles County press release, and from an SCE Form 8-K. They are descriptions of investigations and regulatory processes as the sources state them, not findings by this site.

2017/2018 wildfires and mudslides (SED agreement). The 10-Q says that in October 2021 SCE and the CPUC's Safety and Enforcement Division (SED) executed an agreement resolving SED's investigations into the 2017/2018 Wildfire/Mudslide Events and three other 2017 wildfires for aggregate costs of $550 million, made up of a $110 million fine paid to the State of California General Fund, $65 million of shareholder-funded safety measures, and SCE waiving its right to seek cost recovery in CPUC-jurisdictional rates for $125 million and $250 million of third-party uninsured claims payments (and related financing costs) in the Thomas/Koenigstein/Montecito and Woolsey litigation. It also states that SCE did not admit imprudence, negligence or liability in that agreement.

Eaton Fire (January 2025): fire-agency report, SCE's statements and open reviews. On August 4, 2026 the Los Angeles County Fire Department (LACoFD) released redacted investigative reports on the cause of the Eaton Fire. The County's press release says the LACoFD Arson Fire Investigation Unit conducted the investigation jointly with CAL FIRE and that 'the investigation concluded that the cause of the wildfire conflagration was due to the electrical arcing events that took place on the out-of-service Southern California Edison (SCE) tower'. It says the reports are redacted because the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office 'has an ongoing review of the evidence from this fire'. This is an investigative conclusion of the fire agencies, not a court judgment, a CPUC finding or a finding of this site. The 10-Q (filed July 30, 2026, before the release) says the SED is conducting an investigation, that the District Attorney's Office has an ongoing investigation 'for the purpose of determining whether any criminal violations have occurred', and that SCE 'is not aware of any basis for' felony liability. SCE's own position in that 10-Q is that it 'has not conclusively determined that its equipment caused the ignition', that 'a viable explanation is that a de-energized idle SCE transmission facility in the preliminary area of origin was associated with the ignition', and that it 'believes that it is likely that its equipment was associated with the ignition'. LAist reported on the release that an SCE spokesperson said the company was 'currently reviewing' the report. The 10-Q also says any fines and penalties incurred in connection with the Eaton Fire 'will not be recoverable from insurance, from the Wildfire Fund, or through electric rates'. The CPUC will later review SCE's Eaton Fire costs in a formal proceeding; the 10-Q says no final decision has yet applied the California wildfire cost-recovery prudency framework.

Other SED actions described in the 10-Q. For the 2022 Fairview Fire (Riverside County), the 10-Q says the SED issued a citation in March 2025 for approximately $2 million for alleged violations of SED rules, including failure after the fire to comply with clearance requirements for an electrical conductor, and that SCE received a November 2023 CAL FIRE report of investigation 'in which CAL FIRE finds that the Fairview Fire was caused when a sagging SCE electrical conductor came in contact with a communication line'. For the 2022 Coastal Fire (Orange County), it says the SED issued a notice of violation in 2025 and that SCE received a September 2024 report from the Orange County Fire Authority, 'in which the OCFA finds that the Coastal Fire was unintentionally caused by sparks from overhead SCE electrical equipment igniting vegetation under the equipment'. For the 2019 Saddle Ridge Fire, it says the SED issued a report listing alleged violations of CPUC General Orders and that, as of the filing, an inverse condemnation bench trial had been set for October 2026. These are the agencies' findings as SCE's filing reports them.

Wildfire Fund and rate recovery. The 10-Q says the Wildfire Fund administrator 'has confirmed that the Eaton Fire is a "covered wildfire"' and that SCE 'will be reimbursed for losses incurred in excess of $1.0 billion' for eligible third-party damage claims, subject to the administrator's approval. It also describes the Woolsey Settlement Agreement as 'a settlement agreement entered into between SCE and intervenors in September 2025 in the CPUC-jurisdictional rate recovery proceeding related to the Woolsey Fire'. SCE's Form 8-K says that on July 28, 2026 SCE Recovery Funding issued $1,953,948,000 of Senior Secured Recovery Bonds, Series 2026-A; the 10-Q says the proceeds finance cost recoveries authorized under the Woolsey Settlement Agreement and that the bonds are serviced from non-bypassable rates and other charges collected from certain existing and future customers in SCE's service area.

Wildfire safety oversight. The 10-Q states that in February 2026 the Office of Energy Infrastructure Safety issued a final decision approving SCE's 2026-2028 Wildfire Mitigation Plan and in March 2026 issued SCE's safety certification, valid until the later of March 2, 2027 and when the Office acts on SCE's next request.

Who SCE is: ownership, service area and what the CPUC regulates

Southern California Edison Company is a California corporation headquartered in Rosemead, California, and a wholly owned subsidiary of Edison International (NYSE: EIX), per the joint Form 10-Q. SCE says it delivers power to 15 million people in 50,000 square miles across central, coastal and Southern California, excluding the City of Los Angeles and some other cities, covering more than 180 incorporated cities and 15 counties (company statement). SCE says it was officially incorporated in 1909.

SCE is an electric delivery utility, so billing disputes and service-quality complaints are within the CPUC Consumer Affairs Branch's scope; the Branch does not handle municipal utility complaints, according to CPUC. Some Southern California customers receive electricity through community choice aggregators or municipal utilities, in which case the generation supplier or city utility, not SCE, is the right first contact for generation charges (SCE's Help Center lists a Community Choice Aggregation topic).

SCE's 10-Q describes the 2025 General Rate Case (GRC) decision, which the CPUC adopted in 2025 and which SCE says increased its authorized revenue starting in the third quarter of 2025 with a 2026 escalation mechanism. Rates and the revenue SCE may collect are set in CPUC proceedings; customers can follow them and comment through the CPUC.

Complaint record: BBB, Trustpilot and this site's archive

As displayed on October 11, 2026. The BBB profile for Southern California Edison Company, Rosemead, CA shows 'NOT BBB Accredited', a BBB rating of D- with the stated reason 'Failure to respond to 5 complaint(s) filed against business', 86 total complaints in the last 3 years, 59 complaints filed in the last 12 months, and 0 customer reviews. BBB lists three further separate SCE profiles (Ventura, San Francisco, Rancho Cucamonga), also rated D-, which are not combined here. Trustpilot's page for www.sce.com is unclaimed and shows 60 reviews with a 1.5 rating, and says it does not fact-check reviews. These are different platforms measuring different things and are not added together; a BBB letter grade is BBB's own rating, and the number of complaints should be read against the size of a utility serving millions of customers.

This site's own archive. usacomplaints.com holds 19 approved posts that name Southern California Edison or Edison International: 18 name SCE as the subject (written between 2005 and 2012) and one, from 2001, names Edison International. They are individual accounts, not verified findings, and SCE's responses are not recorded in them. Posts that concern other utilities with similar names (for example SCE&G in South Carolina, Con Edison, Commonwealth Edison) are not counted.

By a keyword count of those 18 posts: 12 dispute a bill amount or a charge; 11 mention power being shut off, not turned on, or an account being closed; 4 describe a charge or balance that the writer says belongs to another person or an earlier tenant; and 3 mention a deposit. A post can fall into more than one group. The archive is a historical record of what individual writers alleged and does not describe current SCE practices.

Court and claims record: wildfire litigation and settlements

SCE's joint Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 reports the following as of July 23, 2026. Lawsuits are allegations until decided, and SCE says it has not admitted wrongdoing or liability in any of the settlements below.

Eaton Fire. SCE reports awareness of approximately 2,000 currently pending unsettled lawsuits representing approximately 32,000 individual plaintiffs, plus subrogation plaintiffs and public entity plaintiffs including the United States of America, the County of Los Angeles, the City of Pasadena and the City of Sierra Madre. Some were filed as purported class actions, and the 10-Q says a bellwether jury trial had been set for January 2027 as of July 23, 2026 (a later court docket was not checked). In January 2026 SCE filed a cross-complaint against certain public and private entities whose actions or inaction it says may have contributed to the losses. Through June 30, 2026 SCE reports settlements with insurance claimants and claimants under its Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program, with $517 million of Eaton Fire settlements paid and $1.6 billion in losses recorded for settlements; it says claimants who settle release SCE and Edison International and that no admission was made. On October 1, 2026 SCE issued a news release (its own statement, as of that date, not added to the 10-Q figures) saying the program had received more than 5,000 claims, extended nearly 2,900 offers to almost 7,200 claimants totaling more than $1 billion, and paid more than 3,850 claimants over $535 million; it also says that on average SCE delivers offers 36 days after receiving a substantially complete claim.

2017/2018 Wildfire/Mudslide Events. SCE reports 9 pending unsettled lawsuits (21 plaintiffs) related to the Thomas and Koenigstein Fires and the Montecito Mudslides and 17 (28 plaintiffs) related to the Woolsey Fire, settlements with approximately 13,800 individual plaintiffs and $9,707 million of settlements paid since inception. In the Woolsey Fire litigation the 10-Q says that, as of July 23, 2026, a damages and liability trial with the California Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES) was set for October 2026 and one opt-in household was set for trial on November 16, 2026. The 10-Q also reports that the court denied class certification in the one purported class action in the Thomas/Koenigstein litigation and that plaintiffs have appealed.

Other wildfire events. SCE reports having settled substantially all claims related to the 2017 Creek Fire, 2020 Bobcat Fire and 2020 Silverado Fire, and describes pending litigation for the 2019 Saddle Ridge, 2022 Coastal and 2022 Fairview fires.

Wildfire Recovery Compensation Program. SCE's program FAQ describes it as voluntary: participation 'does not affect any rights until a claimant accepts the compensation offer and signs a release'; Fast Pay offers are promised within 90 days of a substantially complete claim; an offer 'becomes void' if not accepted within 90 days, after which the claimant retains the right to litigate; and accepting requires a signed, notarized release of claims against SCE and related entities. The program page states that participation 'does not constitute an admission of liability or wrongdoing'. The same FAQ says that settlement offers 'are not negotiable' (a claimant may add information or request a Detailed Review), that a Detailed Review offer can be expected 'within nine months once all required documentation has been submitted', that signing a full release 'waives all past and future claims related to the Eaton Fire, against SCE and related entities', that upon payment any ongoing litigation 'must be dismissed with prejudice', and that claimants 'are solely responsible for any liens', including those of healthcare providers, mortgage lenders, attorneys, insurers or government agencies. Its closing statement reads that the company 'expressly denies responsibility for the underlying events'. Claimants should read the Protocol and consider independent legal advice before signing.

Is Southern California Edison Legitimate?

SCE is a California investor-owned electric utility: its registrant filings with the SEC list Southern California Edison Company as a California corporation at 2244 Walnut Grove Avenue, Rosemead, a wholly owned subsidiary of Edison International, and the CPUC lists it among the electric utilities its Consumer Affairs Branch handles complaints for. BBB shows it as not BBB accredited with a D- rating and 86 complaints in three years as displayed on October 11, 2026; the BBB file records that rating, not a finding about the utility's operations.

The documented record includes a $110 million fine and other measures in a 2021 SED agreement (without admission of imprudence, negligence or liability), a 2025 SED citation of approximately $2 million for the Fairview Fire, an August 4, 2026 Los Angeles County Fire Department report (investigated with CAL FIRE) attributing the Eaton Fire's cause to electrical arcing events on an out-of-service SCE tower, which SCE's 10-Q (filed before that report) addresses by saying it believes it is likely its equipment was associated with the ignition, an open SED investigation and a Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office review, and large pending wildfire litigation in which no court decision on liability was identified. A customer with a billing or service problem has a defined route: SCE first, then the CPUC Consumer Affairs Branch.

Court & Public Records

Related Complaints

Names this company in a role other than the primary subject — not necessarily current or complete.

• Named as an affiliate: Edison international ripoff

Company Relationships

• Owned by: Edison International

Frequently Asked Questions