Essential Energy planned power outage on Lord Street raises ire of business owners

A number of businesses and houses on Lord Street were affected including a medical practice, pharmacy and blood pathology lab.

A spokesperson said several businesses in the block were not informed of the planned power outage.

"The pharmacist called in last week with a letter of notice that there will be scheduled power outage for today," the spokesperson said.

"I checked our mail and we hadn't received such a letter at all."

She said had the pharmacy had not made them aware of the outage it would have been a major inconvenience for their business and clients.

"We would have lost a day of business had we not been prepared with a generator."

Douglass Hanly Moir laboratory manager Anne Alpen described the whole situation as "disappointing".

"The communication between Essential Energy and the public is poor and should be a lot better than it is," she said.

The laboratory only found out about the outage at 9am on the morning of July 25 resulted in "panic" as staff had to quickly locate a generator to run a blood fridge.

"We have a lot of equipment and doctors rely on us to do tests urgently. We had to transfer it to our other laboratory."

A spokesperson for Essential Energy disputed the fact that businesses were not notified.

"As part of Essential Energy's ongoing commitment to provide safe, reliable and sustainable power supply to households and businesses, we are undertaking upgrade and maintenance works to the electricity network in the Lord Street, Port Macquarie area on Thursday, 25 July," the spokesperson said.

"To allow our crews to safely complete the work, over 160 customers experienced an interruption to their power from 9.30am to 3pm.

"All affected customers have been sent a notice confirming the details of the planned power interruption either via letter or SMS on 9 July 2019.

"Under the National Energy Customer Framework, Essential Energy is required to provide customers with a minimum of four business days' prior notice to planned power supply outages to enable customers to make alternative arrangements."

Meanwhile, tension continues after Essential Energy confirmed it plans to slash up to 182 jobs across the state.

It is expected Port Macquarie will be the hardest location hit with at least 34 jobs to go.

Some staff have questioned financial management of the Buller Street upgrade of the Essential Energy office in Port Macquarie. The upgrade of the building is estimated at $12 million.

An ex-employee of Essential Energy described the Buller Street refurbishment as "unnecessary and insulting to those employees who are losing their jobs", and questioned the breakdown of the project's costs.

Power industry unions have reached an in-principle agreement with Essential Energy in the Fair Work Commission on July 5 that will see the company pause planned job cuts across regional NSW until further information is provided to workers and additional consultation takes place.

On July 24 Electricity Trades Union secretary Justin Page met with Port Macquarie MP Leslie Williams, a meeting Mr Page described as "positive".

"I highlighted the fact that we have never seen morale so low at Essential Energy as it is currently, which is a direct result of the terrible way that management has handled these proposed job cuts," Mr Page said.

"I also outlined that the union believes Essential Energy can and must do more to mitigate job losses and genuinely consult with workers.

Mrs Williams said she has made it "crystal clear that she will not tolerate any forced job losses at Essential Energy in Port Macquarie".