KEY POINTS:
The contractor who cut off the power to Folole Muliaga's house said he saw tubes coming out of her nose but didn't ask if she had a medical condition.
The contractor, who cannot be named, told an inquest at Auckland Coroner's Court that Mrs Muliaga did not tell
him she used an oxygen machine and needed the power for health reasons.
Mrs Muliaga, who was using an oxygen machine, died in her Mangere home after the contractor cut her power because of an overdue bill of $168.40.
The contractor, whose company Vircom is contracted by Mercury Energy to undertake disconnections and reconnections, told the inquest he was given the notice to disconnect power at Mrs Muliaga's address at the start of the day.
He said he went around the back of the house and disconnected the power, a process taking about three minutes.
He handed a disconnection notice through a window to Mrs Muliaga's son Ietitaia, and while on his way from the property was asked by Ietitaia to come and speak to his mother.
The contractor met with Mrs Muliaga at the living room table, after which he chatted for another two to three minutes.
He agreed that she said "give us a chance", and that she asked about how to reconnect the power, but he said at no stage had she said she needed the power for her health.
The contractor said her request to give her a chance was not uncommon, and he usually took it to mean somebody wanted another chance to pay the bill.
Though he saw the tubes coming from her nose, the contractor said he did not see an oxygen machine and he did not think to ask about the tubes.
He said she didn't bring the matter up, and he thought it inappropriate to ask about what he thought was a private matter.
When the noise the oxygen machine makes when the power is turned off was demonstrated to him in court, the contractor said he heard no such noise at the Muliaga house.
The contractor said he had not gone ahead with disconnection for humanitarian reasons once before and after the Muliaga incident.
Beforehand he did not disconnect at a place for people with intellectual disabilities, and afterwards at a place with a newborn baby.
He said on both occasions people mentioned their issues specifically and he rang Mercury Energy, who agreed he should not cut the power off.
Cross-examination of the contractor will continue tomorrow.
Earlier in the day, former Mercury Energy manager James Moulder said it now treated all customers as vulnerable in the wake of Mrs Muliaga's death.
Mr Moulder said Mercury Energy admitted it did not comply with several guidelines for state-owned enterprises in relation to its treatment of vulnerable customers.
He said a call from Mrs Muliaga's husband on May 1 in which he said on four occasions that his wife was in hospital was not enough to flag at the time that she needed electricity for health reasons.
Mr Moulder agreed the processes for telling customers ways to identify themselves as vulnerable weren't as good as they could have been, but that those processes had since been improved.
As a result of Mrs Muliaga's death, he said: "we consider everybody to be vulnerable and we have worked hard to make sure that our systems are better than everyone in the industry because of this tragedy."
He said guidelines for dealing with vulnerable customers were not compulsory, but energy companies had been told if they did not follow them, they would become compulsory.
- NZPA
