Anyone use Constellation electric?

[john84]

Anyone in Massachusetts switch there electric company? I currently have national grid and was looking into switching to Constellation electric, anyone have first hand experience?

Anything good or bad you could tell me would be appreciated.

 

[mellow]

I used them back in 2016 and had non-stop billing issues between them and my power company, I switched when my contract was up.

 

[Montecarlossfan]

Not in Mass but have neversource , I locked in at 8.9 in December 2021 until 2024… no issues to report so far, no cancellation fees etc.

 

[john84]

Thanks for the information, I’ll try to look into some other companies.

 

[Montecarlossfan]

Thanks for the information, I’ll try to look into some other companies.

The above should say eversource, my supplier is constellation… I must have been tired when I posted lol

 

[john84]

Constellation is currently 17.99 for 36 months. I currently have national grid, I have to double check but I think they are around 32.99

 

[peakbagger]

A funny thing is Constellation is frequently the firm that wins the standard supply contract for various regional utilities. I think it would be very important to read and understand the fine print of the two competing tariffs. There has to be a difference between the two for such a big difference. As folks in Texas learned during a cold snap, the fine print can mean a power bill of hundreds if not thousands of dollars when it kicks in.

The utility standard offer rate is usually a fixed rate for some period of months. As long as ISO New England can supply it, the rate payer pays that rate (if power is available). That is called a firm rate so the supplier has to assuming the worse case, as they end up eating it not the ratepayer. There are lots of potential savings to be had to include fine print in the contract where the power rate is tied to the price of natural gas generated power, the supplier knows the heat rate of their power plants and much of the time they can buy non firm gas at far below the firm rate. That works until there is cold snap in the region where all the firm gas is being used for heating or supplying power to firm power customers. The non firm suppliers just them have to go on the market and pay what the market will bear and if they can hand cost increase over to the rate payer (like some plans in Texas) they can sell power most of the time for less than the fixed rate. There also can be fine print tied to peak or off peak power where they can bill more for power during peak periods but less during non peak. There can also be block pricing where the price is one rate for less than X KW and more for anything over X. They also can just time the contracts start and end date so that the offer expires prior to historical cold snaps and then raise the rate to a much higher amount when a new contract period starts. Most folks are lazy and once they switch they may not notice it.

In general, if you don't understand the fine print be very careful. Most studies of standard offer versus 3rd party plans is that in the long run the consumer pays more.