Hydro-Québec is offering discounts of several hundred dollars on emergency batteries to customers who suffer frequent outages in four regions of Quebec. However, the discount is less attractive than it seems, one customer noted.
“Hurry! Only 250 batteries are available,” says the email sent by Hydro-Québec to customers in the West Island of Montreal, the Laurentians, the Eastern Townships and the Outaouais this week.
“To reduce the inconvenience of power outages in your area […]take advantage of a reduction of up to $1,500 on the purchase of a spare battery,” announces the state-owned company.
Two EcoFlow brand battery models are offered, the DELTA 2 Max (-$650) and the DELTA Pro (-$1500). The advertised rebates are calculated from the manufacturer’s suggested retail prices ($2399 and $4499).
SCREENSHOT, THE PRESS
Excerpt from Hydro-Québec promotional email
However, several retailers are displaying lower regular prices, a reader told us.
Costco’s website, for example, was listing the DELTA Pro model for $3,179.99 on Friday.
The “exclusive price” offered by Hydro ($2,999) then becomes less attractive.
Compared to a regular price of $3,179.99, “I’m saving just $180 before taxes, not $1,500,” says Nataly Ranger of Pierrefonds.
Other online retailers are listing lower list prices than Hydro for this model, such as $3,699 or $4,199, it found. The Press.
Pilot project
“This is an offer made in good faith,” Hydro-Québec spokesperson Maxence Huard-Lefebvre assured us. “We will monitor the market to ensure that our offer remains advantageous.”
The offer, a pilot project to “see if there is interest in this type of product,” was sent to “a few thousand customers” in about twenty municipalities.
“We targeted specific power lines that sometimes cross several municipalities, not entire municipalities,” writes Mr. Huard-Lefebvre.
Hydro-Québec actually has 500 batteries, and there were still some left on Friday. If some of them don’t find a buyer, they will be used to “test other troubleshooting approaches, such as during planned outages.”
Customers will be asked to complete a questionnaire to say “whether the battery meets their needs.”
PHOTO ALAIN ROBERGE, THE PRESS
“Here, we are in the Bermuda Triangle,” says Nataly Ranger about the frequent blackouts that affect her Pierrefonds neighborhood.
Even though she lives in a “Bermuda Triangle”, where her neighbour counted around fifteen days marked by blackouts between April 2023 and May 2024, Mme Ranger has no plans to purchase a battery.
“How much did they spend on that? I would have preferred if they had sent a team to cut down trees!”
The discount cost “a few hundred thousand dollars,” according to the state-owned company.
This pilot project does not replace the “very ambitious” actions to improve the quality of service, including preventive cutting of trees and branches, its spokesperson stressed.
For the first seven months of the year, Hydro-Québec recorded 318 minutes of outage per customer on average, compared to 898 in 2023, “a decrease of 65%”.
The 2023 results were weighed down by the April ice storm, which affected 1.3 million customers. Vegetation was “responsible for 40 to 70% of outages,” Hydro-Québec said.