As of October, ComEd and Ameren Illinois are charging new electricity supply rates, and customers should know what they are to avoid bad deals peddled by alternative electricity suppliers, the Citizens Utility Board (CUB) said Thursday in a statewide consumer warning. The non-summer prices, through May 2024, are listed on…...
CUB calls on ICC to reject record rate hike for Peoples Gas after agency official recommends big increase for utility
An administrative law judge for the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) has issued a “proposed order” recommending that the ICC approve a record-high $350 million rate hike for Peoples Gas, awarding the company the vast bulk — 87 percent —of the $402 million increase it has sought from regulators. The recommended…...
CUB alerts Ameren, ComEd customers to new power prices
As of October 1, ComEd and Ameren Illinois are charging new supply rates, and customers should know what they are to avoid bad deals from alternative electricity suppliers. The non-summer prices, through May 2024, are listed on the Illinois Commerce Commission’s electric choice website, PlugInIllinois.org: Ameren Illinois 8.107 cents per…...
October gas prices way down from last year–hoping for no prices spikes in the near future
As Illinois enters the first month of the winter heating season, October gas prices continue the trend of being significantly lower than the last two years, with some glaring examples of the volatility that makes consumers so uneasy. Gas utilities file supply prices–called the Purchased Gas Adjustment (PGA)–each month with…...
ICC stats: IL consumers have lost $1.6B with alternative suppliers since 2015, but Ameren customers saved last year
Illinois consumers have lost about $1.6 billion total to alternative suppliers since 2015–but Ameren customers, for a change, saw some savings last year, according to a review of annual reports from the Illinois Commerce Commission’s Office of Retail Market Development (ORMD). Under Illinois law, ComEd, Ameren and MidAmerican customers are…...
CUB review: Most municipal aggregation offers saving money, but changes on horizon
Out of 485 active community power (“municipal aggregation”) offers, about 300 (62 percent) beat or at least matched the utilities’ summer supply rates, according to a CUB review of plans. But more than half (183) of those offers expire over the next year–many of them this December. This comparison covers…...
Should customers fund ComEd’s “marketing charm offensive”?
Crain’s Chicago Business recently wrote how ComEd wants customers to help pay for the utility’s “marketing charm offensive” in the wake of its corruption scandal. In a proceeding before the Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC), Attorney General Kwame Raoul is urging state regulators to make ComEd, and not its customers, pay…...
Scam alert! Beware of these 6 scams in 2023
Illinois consumers are no strangers to scams–a review of the latest statistics shows how the Land of Lincoln is a favorite target. The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Internet Crime Complaint Center reported that in 2022 Illinois ranked fifth in the number of victims (14,786) of Internet-related crime and seventh in…...
