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8.4 out of 10; Satisfaction remains consistently high, 8.6 out of 10; and Value for the money has <br />improved significantly, 7.6 out of 10. <br />Q Market Research staff made particular note of the responses received about rates, stating <br />"Usually, I see lots of complaining about rates, fees, extra charges, etc. This is the first time and <br />first utility where half the comments were that the fees are fair and provide value. Amazing. I'd <br />be curious to know if you have been using the newsletter [ERMU's highest rated medium] to <br />talk about your rate increases or give a context for them." As we discussed for Stakeholder <br />Communications in item 5.02 of this meeting, staff is deliberate about and dedicated to <br />educating the public on the state of ERMU's rates in multiple platforms. <br />Commissioners may remember from the report in June of this year that all the utilities that <br />QMR provides services to have received feedback that some customers are unaware of the <br />rebate offerings, including a large Minnesota municipal utility who specifically created survey <br />questions to get to the bottom of the issue. ERMU has employed several new initiatives to <br />resolve the matter including billboards, newspaper ads, as well as adapting the newsletter and <br />website homepage to highlight rebates. Staff also simplified and redesigned rebate <br />flyers/webpages and incorporated QR codes that support online submissions. The <br />communications department will continue to find ways to reach customers, but valuable <br />context can be found in the chart below. It shows the residential rebate amounts since 2017, <br />which is when we separated them from commercial rebates in our accounting. There has been <br />healthy growth over time, suggesting we are in fact reaching new customers. Even with this <br />information, staff will continue to find new ways to communicate opportunities to customers. <br />ERMU Residential Rebate Amounts <br />$80,000.00 <br />$70,000.00 <br />$60,641.00 $60,902.00 <br />$60,000.00 <br />$49,218.02 <br />$50,000.00 <br />$40,000.00 $35,640.00 $37,703.07 <br />$30,000.00 <br />$20,000.00 <br />$70,643.33 <br />$10,000.00 $8,994.94 <br />$g 125.00 <br />, <br />• <br />$0.00 <br />2017 <br />2018 <br />2019 <br />2020 <br />202" <br />202- <br />2023 <br />2024 YTD <br />NOTE: Combining all previous distributions, this survey has been sent to 10,707 residential <br />customers with 1,156 completed and returned. This is a response rate of 10.8% which meets <br />QMR's target rate for achieving a significant sample size. <br />Page 2of3 <br />125 <br />