With Pennsylvania electric rates projected to increase up to 30% starting January 1, 2011 as rate caps expire for the remaining areas of the state, Pennsylvania businesses are being bombarded by promises of lower electric rates and savings from all types of sources: door-to-door solicitors, tv and radio ads, billboards, and social network marketing.

However, Pennsylvania businesses have to be careful when shopping for a low electric rate, especially when approached by door-to-door sales agents claiming to be brokers or consultants.

In many cases, these self-identified brokers are merely marketing arms of specific energy suppliers.  They are not truly independent brokers that work to get customers the lowest energy rate.  Instead, they are simply a “hired gun” sales force whose job it is to enroll the customer with their client.  Small businesses, particularly storefront businesses and mom and pop shops, need to be acutely aware of this, since they will likely be visited multiple times by a number of different agents trying to get them to switch their electric supplier.  While these agents may be able to promise some savings, customers will be leaving money on the table if they don’t shop around and get electric price quotes from numerous energy suppliers.

These door-to-door agents often are armed with preset electric rates, which are essentially “standing offers” that their client suppliers have authorized them to make available.  This means the rates are generic prices geared towards some average customer, and are not designed to maximize your energy savings by delivering you a customized price quote.  These offers can also become stale, and miss out on price drops in the market that customers could otherwise receive by shopping around.

Pennsylvania businesses looking for a lower electric rate need an independent source to compare multiple rate offers, not just one or two.  SaveOnEnergy.com, a truly independent exchange to compare electric prices, fills this need by offering Pennsylvania businesses customized rate quotes from up to eight energy suppliers competing head-to-head, ensuring customers get the lowest price. 

The best part is it takes only a few minutes to get these competing rate offers, using SaveOnEnergy.com’s exclusive retail exchange portal.  Similar to LendingTree, customers just enter some information about their electric account and usage, and the information is instantly transmitted to up to eight competing energy providers who contact the customer directly with their best offers. 

Electric suppliers competing for customers on SaveOnEnergy.com’s platform don’t leave any margin on the table, because they know that they have to beat seven other electric companies to win the account.  In contrast, an agent soliciting a customer door-to-door may show a customer only one or two electric rate offers, neither of which likely is the lowest from a particular supplier, which gives the customer no real choice.

SaveOnEnergy.com can therefore get Pennsylvania business customers the lowest electric rate, saving them hundreds if not thousands on their electric bills, by putting the power of real competition in the customer’s hands.

If the experience at PPL Electric Utilities is any indication, the majority of Pennsylvania electric customers at PECO, Met-Ed, Penelec, and West Penn Power (Allegheny) are not aware that they are facing electric rate hikes in the neighborhood of 30% starting January 1, 2011 when rate caps expire.

Even though the likely rate hikes are just some five months away, many customers aren’t educated about the state’s competitive electric market and their ability to choose a lower electric rate.

That’s the conclusion in a recent report from Pennsylvania’s Auditor General Jack Wagner, who said that more education is needed to ensure electric customers don’t pay the steep rate hikes when January comes.  Customers can avoid these rate hikes by shopping for a lower priced energy provider, but many customers are unaware of this new right.

The Auditor General examined the experience of the removal of rate caps at PPL, where rate caps ended December 31, 2009, in concluding that most customers are unaware of the looming rate hikes.  Specifically, the Auditor General found that as of September 30, 2009, just three months before customers at PPL were to see electric rate hikes of 30%, only 57% of customers were aware of when rate caps would expire. 

While news coverage, and likely consumer awareness, of the expiring rate caps accelerated in November and December 2009, such increased awareness may have been too late to keep customers from taking a hit in the wallet.

That’s because switching your energy supplier in Pennsylvania is a process than can take six to eight weeks, because switches must occur on a regularly scheduled meter read which only occurs once a month.  That means if customers wait until the last minute to shop for a lower electric rate, they may “miss” being switched to their new energy provider in time to avoid the rate hike. 

Put another way, a customer choosing a new electric company in December 2010 hoping to avoid rate shock at PECO or another utility on January 1, 2011 is very unlikely to have their switch executed in time, and will end up paying at least one month of the higher utility rates before their switch to a lower cost supplier takes effect 6-8 weeks later in January or February.

That’s why Pennsylvania electric customers have to be shopping for a lower electric rate now, so they can ensure their switch takes effect before rate hikes occur.  SaveOnEnergy.com offers Pennsylvanians the easiest way to find a low electric rate, with savings just a few clicks of the mouse away.  Only SaveOnEnergy.com provides customers with the ability to have up to eight competing energy suppliers compete head-to-head for the customer’s business, through its exclusive commercial exchange portal.  That means customers can spend less time stressing about higher electric rates, and more time saving money.

The best news for Pennsylvania customers is that electric rates right now are at lows not seen in several years, making it the perfect time to shop.  And SaveOnEnergy.com can help customers “forward contract” their energy purchases, meaning customers can buy power at today’s low rates, for delivery starting January 1, 2011 when rate caps expire.  This forward contracting allows customers to find a low cost energy supplier well before rate caps expire so the switch can be timed to occur precisely when the rate caps end, but still allows customers to benefit from their capped electric rates until deliveries under the forward contract begin, giving customers the best of both worlds.

Everyone would rather spend time on something more fun than paying their monthly electric bill, so many customers just simply scan their bill for an amount, write a check, and forgot about their electricity until the next month.  However, this behavior can put Texans in danger of seeing their rates increase by 25%, 50%, or even 100%, in situations where a customer’s fixed-price contract expires.  You need to check your energy rate on your bill every month, to ensure you are getting a low rate comparable with the low rates available on SaveOnEnergy.com.  If you are paying a higher rate for electricity, it may be time to switch to a new energy provider.

Thousands of Texans have taken advantage of SaveOnEnergy.com to lock-in a low electric rate for 12, 18, or 24 months, if not longer.  However, because customers tend to “set it and forget it” when it comes to choosing an electric company, customers often forget when their low, fixed rate ends, exposing them to a higher price.

When a customer’s contract expires, the customer has the right to select any product or provider they desire.  However, if the customer isn’t keeping track of their contract, they may take no action, simply because they aren’t aware their contract is expiring.  If a customer doesn’t take any action when their contract expires, Texas electric providers have the right to place customers on the provider’s “default” rate.

These default rates can be much higher than both the customer’s current rate, and other rates in the market.  Worse, these default rates change month to month, and follow any price spikes seen in the energy market.

As noted by one Forth Worth Star-Telegram correspondent, these default rates can triple a customer’s electric bill.  One customer ended up with a $550 monthly electric bill, when their bill is normally less than $200, because their contract had expired, and their provider moved them to a default rate.

While Texas energy suppliers must notify customers of contract expiration, the notification process is not robust.  Suppliers are required to mail or email a contract expiration notice.  However, mailed notices often wind up with junk mail discarded by the customer, since the notice may be separate from the customer’s normal monthly bill.  Electric companies may also email customers a contract expiration notice, but customers may not be expecting such important legal information in their email inbox, and may have given their provider a secondary email address, for privacy and spam concerns, which they do not check often.  While electric suppliers must have a customer’s “consent” to send legal contract notices via email, such consent usually amounts to the supplier informing the customer, in the lengthy Terms Of Service which many customers do not read, that the customer automatically consents to email notice unless the customer objects.  Many customers are thus unaware they’ve unwittingly agreed to receive important contract notices via email.

This is why you need to check your energy rate every month, and compare it against prices in the market.  Fortunately, comparing energy rates takes only a few seconds using SaveOnEnergy.com.  All you need is your bill, which will state your energy rate listed as “the average price you paid for electric service this month,” or a similar description.  You can then go online to SaveOnEnergy.com, enter your zip code, and see the lowest electricity rates in Texas.  Determining if you’re paying too much for electricity can be done any time day or night, meaning there’s no excuse for not checking your energy rate.

Starting this month, Texans will start getting their first electric bills of the season reflecting higher amounts for summer air conditioning usage.  Seeing these higher bills, which can increase monthly electric costs by at least $100, is what typically drives most Texans to shop for a lower electric rate, even though summer is traditionally not the best time to find a low rate.

However, so far this summer, Texas electric rates have remained low, meaning it’s still a great time to lock-in a low, secured fixed rate for electricity when you get that first summer power bill.  SaveOnEnergy.com is Texans’ one-stop shop for finding a low electric rate and comparing the different offers and options from energy suppliers.

Even though the weather has heated up, which typically pushes Texas electric rates higher, rates have remained relatively stable over the past two months, and the great deals that were available in the spring are still around.

Texas electric rates remain at historic lows because of reduced demand due to the recession, and a much lower price for natural gas, the main driver of Texas electric prices.  Last week, even as a heat wave boosted power consumption across much of the United States, natural gas prices were down another 6% as storage inventories continued to grow. 

This means great deals on electric rates are still available to Texans.  For example, customers in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex (at Oncor) can lock-in a low, fixed rate for electricity for just over 9¢ per kilowatt-hour.  In Houston (at CenterPoint), low fixed rates are available for just above 10¢ per kilowatt-hour, which is half of what the prevailing Texas electric rates were just two summers ago.  Customers need to lock-in a low electric rate now to take advantage of these historic low prices, and avoid any potential spike in Texas electric rates, such as the rates of more than 20¢ per kilowatt-hour seen during the summer of 2008.

If you’ve put off shopping for a low electric rate until seeing that first monster power bill of the summer, there’s still time to act.  SaveOnEnergy.com offers customers the fastest and easiest way to compare the lowest electric rates in Texas, allowing customers to save money on their power bills with just a few clicks of the mouse any time day or night.

More and more, Texans are learning that being green doesn’t mean having to spend more green.  With Texas leading the U.S. in the production of wind power, Texans can enjoy a low, stable, and most importantly pollution-free electric product for virtually no premium, all while reducing harmful emissions and helping the U.S. become more energy independent.  SaveOnGreenEnergy.com is Texans’ best source to find and compare renewable energy products and prices, making the choice to go green fast and easy.

Most customers want to go green to help the earth, but believe they’ll have to pay more to do it.  With SaveOnGreenEnergy.com forcing electric companies to compete against each other, that’s no longer the case.

For example, customers using SaveOnGreenEnergy.com in both the Dallas-Fort Worth (Oncor) and Houston (CenterPoint) regions can lock-in a low-fixed rate for 100% pollution-free power for a price in the 10-cent per kilowatt-hour range.  That’s only 10% more than the low rates for so-called “brown” power that doesn’t contain any green content.  More importantly, today’s prices for green energy on SaveOnGreenEnergy.com are about half of what brown power cost just two years ago, when spiking natural gas prices caused conventional power prices to skyrocket.

Customers buying clean, renewable electricity don’t have to worry about market fluctuations in the cost of natural gas, coal, or oil.  Locking-in a low rate for a wind power product shields customers from the rate volatility associated with conventional electric products, providing customers with guaranteed savings in addition to a reduced carbon footprint.

SaveOnGreenEnergy.com is Texans’ one-stop shop for finding a green energy provider.  By harnessing the power of competition to make green energy companies face off head-to-head, SaveOnGreenEnergy.com ensures Texans get the lowest rate for their green energy, meaning going green doesn’t cost a lot of green.  SaveOnGreenEnergy.com also boasts all of the features that make its sister site SaveOnEnergy.com the top source for choosing an electricity provider.  SaveOnGreenEnergy.com provides an easy to understand comparison of renewable electric rates, while also highlighting unique and value-adding features of different green products, such as rewards points, cash back, airline miles, and other bonuses.  This means going green doesn’t have to be a hassle, and can be done in just a few minutes at any time, day or night.  That means Texans can start saving money and helping the environment faster by choosing a renewable energy product using SaveOnGreenEnergy.com.

Despite the lowest electric rates in Texas in more than five years, many Texans are still overpaying for electricity because they haven’t checked their energy rate, and compared it with competing energy suppliers.

If you haven’t checked your energy rate since 2008, when electric rates reached historic highs, you’re probably paying too much for electricity.  In the summer of 2008, spiking natural gas prices and record usage pushed Texas electric rates above 20¢ per kilowatt-hour.  To avoid further price spikes, may customers locked-in rates of 17¢, 18¢, or even higher, to give themselves some price security until the markets calmed down, and prices started dropping.

But many Texans haven’t compared their energy rate as prices have fallen over the past two years.  As a result, even though most Texans can find a low, fixed rate in the 9¢ per kilowatt-hour range, millions of Texans are paying inflated rates of 15¢ per kilowatt-hour, if not more.

Another reason many Texans are overpaying for electricity is that they’ve never checked their energy rate since competition started in 2002.  They’ve always stayed with the successor to their old monopoly utility: the so-called “incumbent” provider like TXU in the Dallas area, or Reliant Energy in the Houston area.  For these customers who have never shopped, the incumbent providers typically charge higher rates with more built-in profit — typically at least 5¢ per kilowatt-hour above the lowest rate they offer to new customers — because they don’t expect these non-shoppers to compare their rates against competitors.  These higher incumbent prices can raise bills by over $50 per month, or $600 per year. 

That’s why you need to check your energy rate and shop for a lower rate using SaveOnEnergy.com, which provides Texans with the simplest way to compare the lowest energy rates in the market.  If you’re paying more than 12¢ per kilowatt-hour, you are simply paying too much money for electricity for no reason.  Even premium products like renewable energy or plans that guarantee price security for an extended 24 months are below 12¢ for most parts of Texas.  You can still enjoy the same reliable service from a vetted and screened energy provider when choosing a lower energy rate using SaveOnEnergy.com, all while saving hundreds of dollars per year.

As the extreme heat of the Texas summer is about to begin in earnest, Texans still have an opportunity to lock-in an extremely low electric rate for the next 12 months to give them price protection against any price spikes associated with the hotter summer weather.  SaveOnEnergy.com provides the best comparison of the lowest electric rates in Texas, while ensuring customers find a reputable and established electric provider.

Texas electric rates typically rise during the summer as the large amounts of air conditioning used by Texans to keep cool strain the electric grid, and require more power to be generated.  This extra power, generated by the most inefficient plants which are pressed into service only during such “peak” times, can raise electric rates for customers who haven’t locked-in price protection.

Fortunately, Texas electric rates are still at historic lows, and haven’t substantially increased from the springtime, which is usually the best time to shop for power.  That means if you’ve put off shopping for a low electric rate because you’ve been too busy, you still have a great opportunity to find a new energy provider offering a secure, low fixed rate for 12 months, or longer. 

In the summer of 2008, Texas electric rates spiked to as high as 20¢ per kilowatt-hour — or even more — due to record demand as well as high natural gas prices.

Compare that to the low rates available today.  For example, a customer in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area (at Oncor) can lock-in a fixed rate for a little more than 9¢ per kilowatt-hour for 12 months, a savings of over 50%.  And that low rate isn’t a teaser rate, it’s guaranteed to provide customers with a low, reliable rate for a year, shielding them from any extreme price spikes that the electric market experiences.  Rates in the Houston area (at CenterPoint) are a few tenths of a penny higher, but are still a great value compared with prices over the last five years. 

As the weather gets hotter and hotter, the opportunity to lock-in a low electric rate may disappear, so customers should take advantage of today’s low prices to guarantee themselves price protection.

Pennsylvania business customers can save money on both their electric and natural gas bills by shopping for an alternative electric or gas supplier, under the competitive markets set up in the state.  Shopping for an electricity rate will become imperative for business customers facing rates hikes of 30% starting January 1, 2011, as decades-old rate caps expire at the last remaining utilities, such as PECO in the Philadelphia area.  The competitive energy markets are a vast and complicated field, and SaveOnEnergy.com can help customers navigate this new terrain to ensure that they pay the lowest rates for their electric and natural gas supplies.

Only SaveOnEnergy.com offers its exclusive retail exchange portal, in which up to eight competing energy suppliers compete directly for your business.  The exchange portal is like an online clearinghouse (think LendingTree.com) where new energy providers produce customized low rates to meet your supply needs.  Businesses just need to enter some basic information about their electric usage and utility service area, and the information is instantly transmitted to up to eight competing energy suppliers.

One of the many features that sets SaveOnEnergy.com apart from other brokers is that the SaveOnEnergy.com exchange portal allows customers to receive rate offers directly from the competing suppliers.  In this way, customers can be assured that offers are not being “filtered” to favor one supplier.  Other brokers, who act as a go-between in providing the rate quotes to customers, may have an incentive to hold back the lowest rates, because the lowest rates are from a supplier that pays a lower commission to the broker.  Since SaveOnEnergy.com’s exchange portal provides the rates directly to the customer with no middleman, customers can be assured that they are not being steered toward higher rates.

By having up to eight competing energy providers competing for the customer’s business, SaveOnEnergy.com’s exchange portal creates a cut-throat competitive environment that benefits customers.  Suppliers who may hold back their lowest rates when selling to a customer one-on-one (in hopes that the customer does not shop around) can’t afford to do so with SaveOnEnergy.com, because one of the other seven suppliers competing for the customer through the exchange portal will surely undercut them.  In this way, SaveOnEnergy.com ensures that customers get the lowest rates possible, without spending hours and days reviewing and comparing different energy companies and rates.

Customers at utilities such as PECO, Allegheny Power (West Penn Power), Met-Ed, and Penelec, “could start to hear in coming months from competitors who want to sell them cheaper electricity,” the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported last week. 

The Tribune-Review noted that on January 1, 2010, rate caps at PPL Electric Utilities in the Lehigh Valley expired.  As a result, PPL raised its residential electric prices by 30 percent in January.

“Since then more than 420,000 residential customers, or about 30 percent of the total, stopped buying power from the Allentown-based utility,” the Tribune-Review noted, as these customers have realized savings of 10-16% by choosing an alternative electric supplier.

With rate caps expiring at PECO, Allegheny, Met-Ed and Penelec on January 1, 2011, these customers will also soon have the opportunity to choose a new energy supplier to save money on their electric bills.  The Tribune-Review reports that new electric suppliers are making preparations to enter these utility areas to serve residential customers in the coming months, while new suppliers are already making low-prices offers to commercial and industrial customers in these service areas, allowing them to lock-in a low, fixed electric rate before rate caps come off.

More than a dozen competing energy providers are vying for customers at PPL, and such competition has led to a double-digit decrease in rates.  The same number of competing suppliers and downward pressure on bills can be expected in the coming months at PECO, Allegheny, Met-Ed and Penelec.

Pennsylvanians can quickly and easily find the lowest electric rate using SaveOnEnergy.com, which compares the lowest rates from the best suppliers with just a few clicks of the mouse.  SaveOnEnergy.com makes the process of finding a new energy supplier simple and hassle-free for customers shopping for the first time, allowing them to save hundreds on their energy bills in just a few minutes.

There are now over 100 new electric generation suppliers competing to serve Pennsylvania’s business customers, but while this competition can drastically lower Pennsylvanians’ electric bills, customers need to be sure that they find a reputable and competent energy provider that will be around for the long haul.  That’s where SaveOnEnergy.com can save Pennsylvania businesses not only money on their electric bills, but hours and hours of time in finding the right energy supplier.

The risks from choosing the wrong electric supplier are not just hypothetical.  In other markets where electric competition has allowed customers to save money on their electric bills, there have been energy suppliers that have gone out of business, as can be expected in any market where competition is driving down prices and margins, and only the strong survive.

Pennsylvanians can not simply choose the lowest electric rate when shopping for an energy provider, tempting as that may be.  While a low price is important, customers need to be assured that their electric company can honor that price, whether it be for a short-term contract, or up to 12, 24 or 36 months.  If their energy supplier offers a low “teaser” rate, but can’t stand behind it and goes out of business due to mismanagement or risky plays in the electric markets, customers could be stuck paying extremely high rates for “default” service, which is the safety net service customers are automatically pushed to if their electric supplier goes out of business.  These default rates can be high and volatile, and for some large business customers, they can change every hour of the day, with changes in the wholesale electricity market.  These “hourly” prices can spike as high as thousands of dollars — or more than 10 times the normal price.

Businesses have been exposed to these punitive rates on several occasions in the competitive Texas electric market, particularly in 2008 when five electric providers defaulted and dropped customers to the safety net Provider of Last Resort, mainly due to poor risk management by the suppliers.  Pennsylvania customers must protect themselves against such dangers.  However, researching the 100 electric companies now competing in Pennsylvania would take hours and hours, adding up to weeks if not months.  Moreover, getting a good handle on the competency and capability of each energy supplier in Pennsylvania is a daunting task, as the electric industry is extremely complicated and technical, with limited information available publicly.

That’s where SaveOnEnergy.com can not only save Pennsylvania businesses thousands on their electric bill; SaveOnEnergy.com can also save businesses thousands in hours of research, allowing business owners to focus on what matters, helping their customers and running their businesses.  As noted last week, the experts at SaveOnEnergy.com screen all electric suppliers in the market using a rigorous criteria, including financial strength and management competence.  This includes investigating an energy supplier’s capitalization to ensure that it can weather volatile changes in the electric market; a supplier’s risk management and commodity purchasing strategies to ensure that the supplier is not taking risks with its customers’ money by playing the market; and a supplier’s leadership to ensure that they have a history of sound business decisions and have not broken contracts with customers in the past. 

By relying on the expertise of SaveOnEnergy.com to shop for a lower electric rate, Pennsylvania business customers can be assured that they will not be stranded on a high-priced “default” electric service because their supplier went out of business.  In this way, SaveOnEnergy.com not only provides customers with a low electric rate, but ensures this rate translates into real savings, and doesn’t vanish in just a few months because the supplier went out of business.