Vector to go to court over power outages

The Commerce Commission is taking legal action against Vector, accusing the Auckland lines company of failing to meet its ‘‘minimum reliability requirements’’ for four consecutive years.

The watchdog said it was seeking a fine after Vector failed to meet its obligations to keep power outages below an allowed number and duration.

The commission said Vector, which supplies electricity to more than 500,000 homes and businesses, had said it would not challenge the lawsuit, which has been filed in the High Court at Auckland.

Vector indicated in a statement that it had already reached an agreement with the commission over the size of the fine that the court would be asked to approve.

The commission has previously taken Vector to court over similar matters. It was fined just under $3.6 million in 2019 for an excessive level of power outages in 2015 and 2016.

The company blamed its performance then on the increased frequency of storms, traffic congestion in the city, which increased the time it took maintenance crews to reach faults, and health and safety changes.

Vector has previously faced criticism for being too slow and spending too little on putting more of its electricity lines underground to reduce their exposure to weather-related damage.

The commission said that, under the standards applying until March 2020, Vector was considered to have failed to meet its quality standard if it exceeded its annual reliability assessment in two of three years.

Vector chief executive Simon Mackenzie said the company was committed to complying with regulations.