Pepco Seeks Rate Hike In Maryland; Customers Seek Alternatives
Maryland residents are struggling with problems trying to get electricity service from PEPCO
, a longtime provider in the state. The company says that they could provide better service but it would take money to do so and they want that money to come in the form of rate hikes. Dissatisfied customers are turning away from that option and looking elsewhere for better choices when it comes to who provides their electricity in Baltimore and the surrounding area.
Major problems with PEPCO include:
o Unreliable day-to-day service due in large part to equipment failure. The biggest problem is that customers never know when their power is going to go out. The company is in the bottom quarter of the nation when it comes to how frequently they have outages. More than forty five percent of the outages are caused by equipment failure, a problem that is clearly the fault of the company.
o Very long outage times. The problem isn't just that the power goes out but that the company is not at all quick about getting power restored. Last year Maryland customers who lost power were out of power for nearly three and a half hours at a time. Among many other problems, this caused many customers to lose money because of the food in their refrigerator spoiling during this long outage time.
o Many problems with winter storms. The company has had particularly bad problems with outages due to winter storms. This simply exacerbates the existing problems.
o Costs. PEPCO is not among the cheapest electricity providers in Baltimore and the surrounding area. In other words, customers of this company are paying more and getting less than their neighbors who use other electricity suppliers.
Although customers may already be paying more to get this bad service, PEPCO wants to raise rates even higher. They are seeking a rate hike that would generate over $100 million from Maryland residents alone. The purpose of the rate hike is to make small changes that may (or may not) result in improvements to their service. For example, they want to install smart meters so that theoretically they will know quickly when power goes down for a customer and they can get it up and running faster than they do now. Wouldn't it be nice if they just didn't have day-to-day problems with their power going out?
PEPCO customers are increasingly dissatisfied with this situation. Many are taking matters into their own hands and switching to a low cost electricity provider that can offer lower electric rates. Have you explored your options yet?