Higher Toledo Edison electric rates

Would they happen to have the new digital meters that phone in the usage to WorstEnergy?

There are many, many problems with the new digital meters. When the time comes that I'm forced to choose, I'll opt out even if there is a cost. In some cities the opt out cost is an up front $40 and an additional $12 monthly. Its a price I'm willing to pay to keep digital RF and the wholly incompetant First Energy OUT of my home. $12 is a lot cheaper than the additional $392 I could have to pay if my electricity bill spiked by 300% monthly, which happened to so many customers in CA that a class action suit was filed.

http://energybulletin.net/stories/2011-03-23/problems-smart-grids

I wouldn't be surprised if a company that skimped on maintenance to the point where they almost blew up the city of Toledo would rig their digital meters to their advantage, make millions of dollars, then pay a small fine.

http://www.nirs.org/press/03-13-2002/1

I would check to see if bill was read or estimated. One month this summer we got a bill for $24 totally unreasonable for our home. Come to find out they had estimated the two months earlier and they were way too high. It is hard to tell when you are in the midst of a heat wave if the bill seems reasonable or not.

What are the electric rates up there? We went to digital meters a few years ago and are on a smart grid system now down here. In the summer we have prices that vary based on forecast demand, but overall my bill this past summer was around $200 below what it would have been on the standard plan. Not bad considering how hot and miserable it was.

Here are the rates we have:
Summer rate plan

Weekday Rate Period Price per kWh
Off peak
12am -2pm $0.0450

On peak 2pm -7pm
Low $0.0450
Standard $0.1130
High $0.2300
Critical $0.4600

Off peak
7pm -12am $0.0450

Weekend Rate
(Not shown in bar chart) Period Price per kWh
Off peak 12am -12am $0.0450

Winter rate plan

Block rate plan kWh used Price per kWh
Winter-1 0-600 $0.0573
Winter-2 600+ $0.0173

JustaSooner: What manufacturer/model is your smart meter? Were there complaints about bills being much higher than what the homeowner had previously paid with the old style meters? Were there health complaints about the RF?

We also live in Sylvania and just got our electric bill. It was about 2 times normal. My husband read the meter the day we got the bill and it was nearly 300 KWH less than we were billed for. It was an estimated, not actual reading. It should balance itself out next month. This seems to be happening at least once per year, as we had it happen last year during the summer.

If complaints to First Energy don't work, and your service is supplied by First Energy, I'd recommend talking with a Sylvania city councilman. Sylvania is part of the
Northwest Ohio Aggregation and has a contract with First Energy for its residents. I'd think city council would be interested that Toledo Edison is over billing and not responsive. That's who I'd complain to if First Energy gave me the runaround.

When we get an over estimated bill we immediately call First Energy and give them the actual meter reading. They then rebill us at the lower amount. I'll be darned if I'll smooth out First Energy's cash flow at my expense.

Toledo Edison meter reader seem to use any excuse not to read the meters. Mine was estimated 4 month in a row over the winter. The bills were over estimated so bad that they owed me money when they finally read the meter. Now I read the meter myself on the 17th when they come around and if the bill is too far off, I just go online to their site and put in the correct reading and they adjust the bill within 2 days.

Call the Ohio Consumers counsel, a residential utility consumers' advocate, at 1-877-742-5622.

Also, its website is at http://www.pickocc.org/

I've become interested in these smart meters. I see that as of 2010, a few thousand were being installed in Cleveland, with a forecast of many more thousand sometime after that. Did this project move forward?

http://www.toledoblade.com/business/2010/06/06/Smart-grid-may-glean-more-data-than-watts.html

Here's a report from early 2012 about hacking of these meters:

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Smart-Meters-Start-Getting-Hacked-119198

I've seen no indication that the Toledo area will experience this upgrade.

We've been all smart meters here for 3 years now. Never have had an issue. It has allowed them to roll out a variable pricing model during the summer. Normally in the winter we are at $0.0573/kWh which is pretty comparable to you guys up there. In the summer we have an off peak rate of $0.0270/kWh and then during 2PM-7PM (peak time) the rate varies based on projected demand. It can be the low rate ($0.0270/kWh), standard ($0.068), high ($0.14), or critical ($0.38). Last year we had roughly 5 or 6 critical days and you just turn things off that aren't needed during those hours. Most of the days were at the low rate and maybe 30% were at the standard rate. So overall, not bad at all and can save a ton of money.

It's also neat with these meters of being able to see actual usage in near real time.

My bills have been estimated every other month for the past year, with the exception of last June and July, which were both actual readings. I seem to have the opposite of what many of you are describing. My estimates are typically lower than the actual usage, but they're generally pretty close. This last bill was a little higher than usual, but the month before we had our dehumidifier running almost non-stop after getting some water in the basement.