SUMTER, S.C. — What are you paying for power? News19 has been hearing from Duke Energy customers who say they’re seeing high bills, but don’t know why.
“I don't know what else to do other than sit in the freezing cold in the dark inside to get this light bill to drop,” Sumter resident Matthew Cusworth shrugged. “There's nothing else I can do.”
Cusworth said he’s lived in his current house for three years.
“When I first moved here, my light bill was right at $180, maybe $220, I mean, for forever,” Cusworth explained. “And then all of a sudden we got one light bill that went up from like $270 and then it shot up to $430. And I was like, ‘Well, how’d it do that?”
News19 got a copy of his bills and found that from 2022 to 2023, there was an average increase of $57.01 each month. From 2023 to 2024, Cusworth saw an average increase of $48.36 each month.
News 9 reached out to Duke with questions, and was given a few possible answers for rising costs you might be seeing.
First, there’s two key terms to know: the base-rate and the fuel-rate.
Duke says the base rate covers the company’s cost to operate and maintain the electric system, including the money earned by investors. Duke says base rates are adjusted periodically “to more closely align the rates paid by customers with the costs to serve them.”
Next is the fuel-rate, which increases or decreases annually. Duke says this rate covers the company’s cost for resources like coal and natural gas to run the power plants. Duke says the prices reflect the actual cost the company incurs to fuel the plants. Duke says that rate passes through directly to customers without including any profit.
If you are seeing a bill that seems to have risen specifically at the beginning of this year, Duke said that’s due to “some confusion in the timing of the start of the billing cycle for December (with payment due in January) that has led some customers to believe they owed for two months reading in December/January rather than just one.”
Duke said there was a base rate increase in April 2023 that would show a year to year increase for Duke Energy Progress customers. Duke said with that increase, the typical residential customer in South Carolina using 1,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity started to pay about $10.95 more per month, which is an 8.2% increase.
Also starting in August, Duke said there was an adjustment for the cost of fuel for power plants. Duke said that means “costs for the same usage over the timeframe would certainly have gone up.”
News19 also reached out to the South Carolina Office of Regulatory Staff for more information. A spokesperson for the department said questions about energy bills are often case-by-case and dependent on unique factors like your individual utility, which can impact your bill through fluctuations in the utility’s rate schedule, the price of fuel, usage and other potential surcharges.
Now we have an idea of what may have caused the bills to have risen so customers are wondering if that’s going to keep happening. According to Duke, there is some “good news.”
Duke says on Jan. 4, 2024, it filed the utility’s first base rate review request in five years in South Carolina, aiming to increase system reliability and enhance customer experience.
That said, Duke says it is “seeing a significant decrease to the cost of natural gas for this year’s annual adjustment, which we will submit to regulators later this spring. We expect that to translate to a significant decrease in fuel costs paid by customers and that would be reflected as a decrease in their bills.”
According to Duke, that filing will take place in May with new fuel rates starting in August.
If you have individual questions about your bill, Duke Energy says you can contact its customer service department directly at 800.777.9898.
The state Office of Regulatory Staff also has a Consumer Services department, which is designed to serve as a mediator between customers and investor-owned utilities in South Carolina. If you have questions about understanding your monthly bill, you can call 803-737-5230 if you’re located in Columbia. If you’re located anywhere else in South Carolina, you can call the toll-free line at 1-800-922-1531. To learn more about your rights and responsibilities as a customer of an electrical utility company, you can find the Electric Customer Bill of Rights here.