You are Tessa Kavanagh, head of customer transformation at Brisbane Metro Utilities. The regulator has opened an inquiry into the company's fines and disconnections, and you have ninety days and A$3 million to show it something better. The first call is which behaviour the pilot goes after.
The situation
It is Monday, 9 February 2026. BMU supplies water and electricity to 1.4 million homes and small businesses across South East Queensland, on revenue of A$1.9 billion a year. In January's heatwave it answered rule-breaking the way the manual says: 4,200 automated fines and a run of disconnection warnings. Within a fortnight, a wrongly fined pensioner and a struggling family disconnected in 39°C heat were all over social media; complaints rose 34%, the Net Trust score fell 12 points, and the regulator's letter arrived. Chasing customers cost A$6.8 million last year. A finding against BMU can bring a penalty of up to A$5 million and a binding order, from the same regulator that sets BMU's prices.
The problem is four behaviours that do not resemble each other. Non-payment or late payment runs at 11% of accounts, about 154,000, with A$47 million overdue. Under the Level-3 water restriction, about 18% of households watered outside the rules, reservoirs fell some nine days faster than planned, and a Level-4 restriction on all 1.4 million customers moved closer. Meter-reading crews are being turned away at the gate. And the hardship register, which suspends collection for customers who cannot pay, carries claims nobody can substantiate, lodged just after a payment demand. Those last two have never been sized.
Inside, Deepa Rangan, general manager of customer operations, holds that enforcement has not failed, only been badly aimed. Julian Petrakis, who runs digital channels, thinks only the app and smart meters can reach and measure 1.4 million customers in ninety days. Outside, a consumer-advocacy coalition chaired by Fiona Ostrowski is preparing a class complaint over the wrongful fines and asking what BMU will do instead. You were hired in November, out of a state revenue office, on one argument: that arrears and rule-breaking are behaviours with identifiable causes, not a moral failing to be punished. The pilot is capped at A$3 million and the regulator's interim report is due in ninety days.