Real utility companies never threaten to cut your power off today, the FTC says

“Real utility companies won’t demand immediate payment to avoid same-day disconnection,” the Federal Trade Commission says, restating guidance because scammers impersonating power, gas and water providers routinely do exactly that. The agency’s advisory, last updated September 15, 2026, describes callers, texters and in-person visitors who claim a customer’s service will be shut off within hours unless payment arrives immediately, typically by wire transfer, cryptocurrency, a payment app or a gift card.

The pressure works by removing the time a target would otherwise use to check the claim independently. Scammers often spoof a utility’s real customer-service number so it appears legitimate on caller ID before a word is spoken, and some pair the call with a text message or an unannounced visit to a home or business to reinforce the deadline and make the threat feel harder to ignore.

The tactics behind a same-day shutoff threat

According to the FTC’s guidance, the contact can arrive by phone, text, email or an in-person visit, and the script stays consistent: a same-day or same-hour disconnection threat paired with a demand for a payment method that is difficult to trace or reverse once it is sent, such as a prepaid card, a cryptocurrency transfer or a person-to-person payment app.

State regulators describe the same pattern from the ground up. Montana’s Public Service Commission warns that a scam caller is typically “very pushy and aggressive,” presses for a prepaid debit card, gift card or wire transfer, and has not sent any of the disconnection notices a real utility mails before cutting off service, according to the commission’s fact sheet on the tactic.

What real utilities do differently

A legitimate utility can confirm a customer’s account number, most recent payment amount and payment date on request, the Montana commission notes, while a scammer typically cannot. Real providers also send formal written notice before any disconnection and accept payment through standard channels — a mailed check, an online account portal or the phone number printed on a past bill — rather than insisting on an app or a prepaid card during the same call that raised the threat.

Pacific Gas and Electric’s own numbers illustrate the scale of the problem for a single utility: the company logged nearly 24,000 reports of customers targeted by impersonators in 2025, with victims losing about $301,000 combined, an average of $590 each, according to a company announcement that also counted nearly 850 attempts targeting small and medium-sized businesses at their doors. “Hang up, close the door and slam the scam,” said Matt Foley, PG&E’s lead scam investigator, adding that customers should then contact the utility through its own listed phone number or official account portal rather than any number or link a caller supplies.

PG&E’s data also points to two variants that do not involve a phone call at all. In one, someone shows up at a home or business claiming to represent the utility and asks to see a copy of the customer’s bill, information a real technician has no reason to request in person. In the other, a caller offers a refund or rebate and asks for banking details to “process” it, reversing the usual script from a demand for payment into an offer of one, but with the same goal of extracting account information the utility already has on file.

The imposter-scam numbers behind the warning

Utility impersonation sits inside a larger imposter-scam category the FTC tracks nationally. Reported losses to all imposter scams reached $3.5 billion in 2025, the agency’s June 2026 data release shows, nearly three times the amount reported in 2020 and close to one in three fraud reports the FTC received that year.

Losses tied specifically to government impersonators rose to roughly $920 million in 2025 from $789 million in 2024, while business impersonation — the category that includes utility companies, banks and delivery services — climbed to nearly $1 billion, with the largest share tied to callers posing as banks. Total fraud losses across all categories reached about $16 billion in 2025, up 25% from roughly $12.8 billion the year before. “Consumers derive enormous benefits from competitive markets built on truthful information. But fraud undermines that foundation, impeding the market process and preventing markets from operating efficiently,” said Christopher Mufarrige, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, whose office also maintains a standing page on impersonation scams tracked across sectors.

For utility customers specifically, the FTC’s advice does not change with the payment method a scammer requests: hang up, call the utility using the number on a past bill or its official website, and report the contact to the FTC or a state attorney general rather than to whatever number the caller supplied.

This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.

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