Lower Rates does not necessarily suggest you should switch companies…

As pointed out in a comment by Whitney in my Welcome post, a lower rate does not imply that a customer will be better off. She suggested in her comment I include the Retail Electric Providers Scorecards as a new link, which I have now placed on the helpful links section of the blog at her suggestion. (http://www.powertochoose.org/_content/_complaint/index.aspx)
Thank you Whitney for your suggestion and hard work on electricity issues.

A couple short comments on this issue of lower rates and consumers being better off just because a rate is lower. As Whitney suggest, " It seems like there is a correlation between low electric rates and high complaint rates." This does not seem to be a far fetched assumption, therefore I plan on doing some more research into this and I will share my results as soon as I have them. I'm no statistician, however I think I can figure some rudimentary evaluation of this assumption. My point is, to ANY CONSUMER THINKING ABOUT SWITCHING COMPANIES!? Please be informed, look at these compliant reports, the Terms of Service Agreements & the Energy Facts Label (EFL ) before switching companies. A lower rate can lead you to a company with hidden fines, surcharges and a poor track record of company dealings with their customers. This in turn can lead to a higher total electric bill, even though your per kilowatt rates are lower.

For example on the surcharges, check this one out I found today in the Terms of Service Agreement and on the EFL for Ambit Energy, "Customers that use less than 1,000 kwh of electricity in any given billing period will be assessed a customer charge of $4.99 for the Heart of Texas plans, $9.99 for the Lone Star plans, and $9.99 for the Ambit Certified Green plans." I'm not claiming these charges are hidden, I'm just stating the consumers must read theses EFLs and Terms of Services agreements to get the full picture. The irony, conservation is being assessed a surcharged under this rate plan. How can we reconcile this with the conservation alert/request of the PUC last week. The $9.99 charge equates to roughly a 9.5% consumption surcharge at 10.6 cents per kilowatt hour based on 1000 kilowatt monthly consumption.
I don't imply that Ambit Energy is the only company with such a surcharge and I will do my best to alert everyone of the others companies and surcharges I discover. This market is a labyrinth and I will disclose my discoveries as I make them. Thank you for your time.

And please remember "The devil is in the DETAILS", read the fine print.