Delivery Charges…

I recently was able to switch over to Smart Energy, as they are charging a lower rate for power, which I believe is 13.5 cents per kilowatt hour, while currently CMP is charging 17+ cents for the same. This lowers my bill substantially. Since this summer here in Maine was so cool, I hardly used my AC, and almost never even used my fan, so I really expected a very low bill. Note, I am a single guy in a small one bedroom apartment, and use very little in the way of power to start with….

I was very surprised to see that I got a $75.00 bill despite the fact that I had a lower rate. I still get a paper bill in the mail, and when I got it for this billing cycle, I noticed that CMP charged me $40.00 for Delivery, which is just to allow Smart Energy to pipe the power across the existing lines, and $35.00 for the power I actually used for the month…

I called CMP, and was told that they are now charging people extra for when you ‘go over’ 50 kilowatt hours per month, and the guy I spoke to even admitted it would be hard for anyone to not go over that. To give him some credit, he is just an employee, and actually sounded like he was not very happy with it either, and is probably paying the same thing, and it being a recorded call, was not at liberty to unload and say what he really feels.

To me, this is just another way to gouge a few extra bucks from people that are already hard up financially, and I’m about to turn 61, am on disability, and have had 4 surgeries in the last 7 years, 2 just to keep me out of a scooter chair. This is getting unnerving.