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Consumer Counsel: Nearly 90% of Retail Supplier Customers Pay More Than Default Service
Nearly 90% of residential retail electric supplier customers pay more for generation than what customers would have paid under Standard Service, the Connecticut Office of Consumer Counsel said in testimony in PURA's electric marketing proceeding.
Using actual rate data from the utilities' consolidated billing system, OCC said that the weighted average price for electricity that residential consumers in Connecticut Light & Power's territory paid to competitive retail suppliers (i.e., not the standard rate) during September 2013 was $0.10763/kWh. This is over 42% higher than CL&P's Standard Offer price of $0.07573, OCC said.
"In total, 56,518 residential customers paid less than CL&P's Standard Offer, 6 residential customers paid the same price as the Standard Offer, and 383,763 (or 87% of suppliers' residential customers) paid more than CL&P's Standard Offer," OCC said.
OCC reported similar results at United Illuminating, for a monthly billing cycle between mid-December 2013 and mid-January 2014.
"The weighted average price for residential service across all 38 Suppliers is $0.11112 per kWh. The standard service price charged by UI during the same period was either $0.076974 (for the period prior to and including December 31, 2013) or $0.090041 (for the portion of the billing period after December 31, 2013). We calculate an average UI standard rate of $0.082355 per kWh for comparison with Suppliers' rates. Therefore, the Suppliers, as a whole, charged consumers approximately 35% more per kWh in the December 2013 – January 2014 time period," OCC said.
"In total, 41,412 residential customers were paying less than UI's Standard Offer and 95,398 (or 70% of Suppliers' residential customers) were paying more than UI's Standard Offer," OCC said.
"The market, as it is presently structured and regulated, is harming the vast majority of customers who choose to purchase service from a Supplier," OCC said.
"Almost half of a million customers are paying above the standard rate for electricity (383,763 customers in CL&P territory and 95,398 customers in UI territory) in Connecticut," OCC said, which calculated that the aggregate monthly cost of these rates in excess of the standard offer is $13.7 million.
Among other things, OCC recommended that, "every Supplier should be required to furnish the customer with a report, no less frequently than once a year or 30 days before the renewal of the customer's contract, whichever comes first, showing the average rate paid by the customer during the prior 12 months and also what the same consumption would have cost under the standard rate in effect during the same period."
Suppliers, "should also be required to disclose to any prospective customer, prior to obtaining that customer's consent to service, a comparison of the average price paid by the Supplier's customers over the prior 12 months and the average price during than same timeframe for service at the EDC's Standard Offer," OCC said
Related Stories Today:
Consumer Counsel Warns Customers About Variable Rates, Also Warns on Providing Account Number Over Telephone
Consumer Counsel Proposes State Publish Customer Reviews of Retail Suppliers
Docket No. 13-07-18
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March 11, 2014
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Copyright 2010-13 EnergyChoiceMatters.com
Reporting by Paul Ring • ring@energychoicematters.com
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