Conned by Con Edison?
I live in a tiny, Jr 1BR (read: glorified alcove studio) in Prospect Heights and I’m getting ridiculous bills from Con Edison and National Grid. Seriously, how does boiling water once a week translate into $123 worth of cooking gas in 2 months? I’ve talked to my absentee landlady, who gets slapped with ridiculous bills…
I live in a tiny, Jr 1BR (read: glorified alcove studio) in Prospect Heights and I’m getting ridiculous bills from Con Edison and National Grid. Seriously, how does boiling water once a week translate into $123 worth of cooking gas in 2 months? I’ve talked to my absentee landlady, who gets slapped with ridiculous bills every so often as well, but she doesn’t know what to do about it either. Some woman came in to read the meter months ago, but that hasn’t helped. I’ve called both Con Edison and National Grid about this but they were (perhaps unsurprisingly) unhelpful. Would anyone be able to give me some advice?
Bklynnight is right. I called National Grid and was told that every gas customer gets a bill with both the delivery charge (always comes from them) and a supply charge (which can come from them or an ESCO). There are all these extra fees and taxes. They told me if no gas was used at all on an account – the minimum charges would have to total close to $30.
delivery charge? I’ve seen it. Its like my old land line phonebill used to have a charge for “dial tone”
Whoa – something is wrong! I actually had an issue w/gas last month w/our gas being shut off for no reason. Turns out the meters were swapped b/t apts (we’re living in X and paying for Y and Y is paying for ours) when the building was built (4 years ago). I believe the original tenants moved out and shut their gas off, which really shut ours off. I’m currently asking for an investigation in the differences b/t apt X and Y, just in case we were paying more.
Regardless… I have a roommate and we use the stove pretty much every night and use the over maybe 2x/week. My National Guard Bill looks like this:
Aug Actual 0541
June Actual 0539
x thermal factor of 1.0269
= 2 therms used in 63 days
Min charge for first 2 therms or less is $28.61
Delivers rate ($.03/therm) $.06
System Benefits Charge ($.0169/therm) $.03
MTA Surcharge (WHAT?!) $.03
GAS DELIVERY SUBTOTAL CHARGES: $28.73
Gas Supply Charge ($.6023/therm) $1.20
4% sales tax $.05
SUPPLY SUBTOTAL: $1.25
4% sales tax on gas delivery $1.15
Bill Charge (inc tax and surchg) $1.65
TOTAL CHARGES: $32.78
The graph comparison also shows that we are using much less therms than other people. Range is 2 (low) to 194 (high)
I don’t get a ‘delivery’ charge on my gas bill. Perhaps delivery is charged to the building and the landlord pays that as part of the costs for hot water (which he pays for)??
I just get cooking gas in my apartment. Never had a bill over $20.
File a complaint with the public service commission. Ask for your meter to be tested IMMEDIATELY.
My last gas bill (from National Grid) starts with a minimum of $14.08 – then adds an additional $26 just for DELIVERY of gas. My Esco charge for 45 CCF’s of gas was $26.66 – that’s for the gas itself. Adding on a system benefit charge, and MTA surcharge, the sales tax on delivery, the GIT per CCF…it goes on and on. Total bill was $70.76 – for cooking gas and hot water heater.
No one’s gas bill could be only $10 per month in Brooklyn. You could use no gas at all, and still will be billed minimum amounts plus tax. If the op’s total Con Ed and National Grid charge for 2 months was $123 – that’s doing pretty well.
tinarina is right; call the Public Service Commission. On a number of occasions I’ve had almost immediate attention from various utilities when calling them directly just resulted in a run-around.
If your bill for $123 is from Con-ed, as your header implies, then you are confused because that is your electric bill. Nat’l Grid supplies gas. If you haven’t actually had your meter read in months then you are getting billed on estimates, which are probably high.
Wow, thanks so much for all the helpful responses! I should have come to the Brownstoner Forum much sooner :-/