Low income families the elderly, and disabled have at least one common enemy I know of in the electricity service market and that is the fly by night energy supplier that will use every last trick in the book to deceive their potential customers.
Now not all or even most electricity companies will try and hide their fees and charges from their electric customers but a few do and they sneak in to areas of the market where deception may go unnoticed for a good long while.
The Public Utility Commissions that regulates a deregulated electricity market and facilitates a smooth customer transition over to the many competitive electricity companies police unethical and corrupt behavior by energy suppliers.
A simple complaint to the PUC of Pennsylvania will usually wrap up disputes you have with your electric company in short order. The problem is low income families, the elderly, and disabled are not as likely to be so aggressive as to file a complaint with the PA PUC.
A glaring ad may say something like start electric service for only $59 “No credit check!” Notice the absence of what the actual electricity rate is?
Now these electricity suppliers in PA that offer a no deposit choice will have the rate in their contract or terms of service somewhere but the picture painted to the customer through glossy sales literature and language is cheap electricity.
When the customer has had their electric service on for a week they may get a call from the prepaid electricity company for an additional $200 if they want their lights to stay on.
After two weeks it becomes painfully obvious to most of these energy providers customers that service is not cheap but very expensive.
Faced with the prospect of having their PA electricity service turned off they stay with these types of no deposit and prepaid electricity companies.
Here is the point I want to drive home though, not all PA no deposit and prepaid electricity companies operate in this manner.
With the addition of smart electric meters there are some large big brand energy companies that will install a device onto your smart electric meter.
A prepaid electricity card only needs to be inserted into the device and you are charged in real time for actual electricity usage used and not an estimate.
You will also be told ahead of time what the electricity rate will be instead of just a start up fee.
So for instance, you may put $100 on a prepaid electricity meter card. You then insert this into a smart meter connected at your home or apartment and the the money is deducted in real time as you use electricity throughout the month.
Prepaid electricity companies that use the smart meters technology generally will disclose to you exactly what the electricity rate will be and how it all works.
In the past prepaid electricity companies in Pennsylvania could easily mislead customers as to what they would pay because the customer would be charged for estimated usage.
In some cases a prepaid electric supplier charging customer for estimated usage would receive double the amount of what the customer may have actually been using.
A year down the road when the no deposit prepaid provider was supposed to compensate for the difference in what the customer paid and what they used the electric company would conveniently go bankrupt, leave the state, and not show for PUC court proceedings.
In this worst case scenario the executives and owners of these companies simply up and ran away with several hundred dollars per electric customer resulting in millions of dollars in personal income to these con artists.
We hope this gives you a general understanding about prepaid electricity suppliers. Not all no deposit energy providers operate in this way but the ones that do hook in many people so it is good this information gets out.
If you have been duped into a no deposit scam for electricity service in Philadelphia please comment below with your story. If we can be of assistance we will comment back with any advice that may help.
