There is an online venue for filing complaints about utility providers with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) that doesn't take long. We have used it successfully in the past. They have two levels of complaints, informal and formal. Don't be put off by the formal, it is what we had success with at very little time on our part. If we don't speak up somewhere things won't change. Even if your complaint fails, the volume of complaints matters. Here is the link to the PUC complaint page:

http://www.puc.state.pa.us/general/filecomplaints.aspx

From: neighborhood-bounces@highlandparkpa.com [mailto:neighborhood-bounces@highlandparkpa.com] On Behalf Of Stephen G. Scalese
Sent: Monday, January 07, 2008 11:23 AM
To: Highland Park
Subject: [Highland Park] Another Kind of Stealing Re-visited

Hi Neighbors...

Thanks for your responses. I received 22 to my first mail about the cost of natural gas. 99.9% were supportive and agreed that they were also shocked. The one I've included below was very helpful in explaining what he has done and describing the situation as it really is. I followed my own advice and looked into my heart, and I've decided that there are too many much more important issues to invest my time in and will let the "market" handle this one. I have little doubt that within the next five years we'll be using greener energy sources anyway. At least, I plan on it. Thanks again for being helpful neighbors.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Yes, I dislike how this works as well.

Here is some info for you though.

The charge for distribution is not abnormal; it covers the gas companies' piping networks. And unfortunately there is "choice". I signed up with Dominion as my supplier a couple years back (Equitable still has the pipes and charges me distribution). Overall, state law requires that companies don't profit from the actual price of the gas BUT there are wide variations in their price (which I think relates partly to their purchasing skill). I have a big house and I've added insulation, a new boiler, etc. but my winter bill (gas plus distribution) still averages almost $500 a month. It kills me to see the $11.80 per mcf charge from Dominion (which varies significantly from Equitable and Columbia) but I tried switching in March and nothing actually happened.

Yvonne Zanos of the newspaper has a pretty good series of columns on this (and in some private e-mails says the gas choice program was a joke and companies are very unrepsonsive). I recommend you hit the website and read these articles.

I would be very willing to join in some political/regulatory pressure to improve the gas companies' responsiveness to switching (much as how it got to be easy to switch telephone providers) OR to increase profit regulation and turn them more into governmental utilities (that would scare them a bit)

Thanks
Lawrence

"Your vision will become clear
Only when you look into your heart..."(Carl Jung)
www.whisperinyourheart.com