Useless Conversation

[ghost]

We went no-cable about 14 years ago and stayed that way for a decade.  We get it now but only watch it for college football.  It could be turned off without so much as batting an eye.  Whenever we are at someone else's house and they have on a show its shocking how asinine the content is.  I would highly suggest to everyone they at least give TV free a shot for 30-60 days. 

[Merusk]

My problem has always been I have to have cable to have internet. There's no "Internet only" providers around here for broadband, so you have to get either basic cable or basic phone service for DSL.  Considering that basic phone service doesn't give long distance, but a bundle through the cable company does for the same price as Phone+DSL it's a no-brainer.

[ghost]

How much do you need long distance?  Maybe just get a calling card or use your cellphone for those calls.  We also have only basic telephone in the house. 

[Arthur_Parker]

It's not a hassle at all to change providers. The worst possible thing I might have to deal with is not having balanced billing for the summer months. It's a really dumb-ass move on their parts.

I'd ring them and mention it, there's a reasonable chance they will offer you a better rate.  Or at least that seems to work in the UK.

[Minvaren]

Cable and Cell Phone companies do the same thing so it's not all that surprising.

Problem for electricity providers in Texas is this: For all the things Texas has fucked up, the way they handled deregulating electricity (specifically, what regulations they KEPT and added) was very well done.

Minus the price increases and most providers having shitty customer service, I'd agree.

[HaemishM]

In short, it takes about two minutes to get a nice table of everyone I can buy power from and compare their plans. It takes about 30 to switch to a new provider, which is done seamlessly. I just send the bills to a different company. The follks maintaining my power lines and responding to outages? Same guys as before.

Shit, I don't have ANY electricity options. If you live here, this is your provider. Go a hundred miles south, you have a different provider oh and you might have one co-op option outside of that.

[Bzalthek]

So I'm right around the corner of graduating with a B.S. in Mathematics and I just landed a summer job as a Monitor for a workforce development center keeping an eye on student workers and intimidating people to keep from abusing the system.  Life is pretty good!

[Merusk]

How much do you need long distance?  Maybe just get a calling card or use your cellphone for those calls.  We also have only basic telephone in the house. 

Long distance is by far the cheapest option.  All the wife's family is out of state and my siblings live in the north end of the city just outside of the local calling radius or in L.A.  We don't have a cell phone, just a trac phone but with all calls being LD those $30 cards go quick.  Not to mention that my part of N. Ky doesn't have the best coverage for cells. (I have a friend who has to go out of her house and up the hill if she's trying to make a cell call and that's on Verizon.) 

Or I can just pay $30 a month to the cable company for a permanent home line that doesn't have signal problems, LD costs or need charging when you have to use it.

[ghost]

Oh, that's right.  I forgot you lived in NKY.  That sucks.  Have you explored a VOIP possibility to go with your cable?  I just got a system for my office and it seems pretty stout.  8x8 is the company.

[Sand]

How much do you need long distance?  Maybe just get a calling card or use your cellphone for those calls.  We also have only basic telephone in the house. 

Long distance is by far the cheapest option.  All the wife's family is out of state and my siblings live in the north end of the city just outside of the local calling radius or in L.A.  We don't have a cell phone, just a trac phone but with all calls being LD those $30 cards go quick.  Not to mention that my part of N. Ky doesn't have the best coverage for cells. (I have a friend who has to go out of her house and up the hill if she's trying to make a cell call and that's on Verizon.) 

Or I can just pay $30 a month to the cable company for a permanent home line that doesn't have signal problems, LD costs or need charging when you have to use it.

Have you looked at either using Skype or that Magic Jack thing they sell at Walgreens?

[Morat20]

Shit, I don't have ANY electricity options. If you live here, this is your provider. Go a hundred miles south, you have a different provider oh and you might have one co-op option outside of that.

Yours are probably tighly regulated, to keep them from overcharging.

I'm considering switching to Green Mountain if I can't get my current folks to drop the damn bill.

[Minvaren]

Just a warning - Green Mountain's billing system is a nightmare.  In the past, they forgot to bill me some months, and then double-billed me others.  My rate got over 22c/kWh a few years back when my contract expired and they started "floating" my rate month-to-month with no explanation.  I finally ditched them when I got a shutoff notice because they had to stop my auto-pay to produce a balanced-billing overage credit for me - and forgot to tell me that they stopped the auto-pay.

On Reliant now (which is who I'm presuming you're on).  Zero billing issues, but they are slightly more expensive.

(/rant)

[HaemishM]

Shit, I don't have ANY electricity options. If you live here, this is your provider. Go a hundred miles south, you have a different provider oh and you might have one co-op option outside of that.

Yours are probably tighly regulated, to keep them from overcharging.

If that's why they are so tightly regulated, it is a major regulation fail. They've been caught overcharging at least once in the last five years and gotten slapped on the wrist for it.

[Morat20]

On Reliant now (which is who I'm presuming you're on).  Zero billing issues, but they are slightly more expensive.

(/rant)

Yeah. I was going to check around on Green Mountain's standards. I hate to give up my balanced billing -- most won't put you on it for three to six months so they can guess your usage, and starting in the summer will make my bills insane until they correct, but when the best rate I can get for a 12-month fixed is 11.8 and I can get 9.6 or lower (even 100% renewable) from everyone else, I'm having a hard time not changing.

[Minvaren]

I think Green Mountain will let you do balanced billing from day 1 if there's history at the address, and if you send in the proper hand-written form via snail mail and wait 6-8 weeks.  As mentioned previously, though - if they overcharge you on balanced billing, you can't get the money back without stopping and restarting (via snail mail) the process.  They also seem to re-calibrate the balanced payment irregularly, between every 6-18 months.

[ghost]

What is balanced billing?

[Morat20]

What is balanced billing?

They take your electricity usage over a year and average it, charging you a set amount per month. It's really useful someplace like Texas -- the summer bill might be three or four times what your bill is in January, for instance.

Someplace with a more even temperature year round, really isn't an issue. But for me, it's easier to pay a flat rate every month without having to think "Oh, it's up in the 90s, my electric bill is going to be 400 bucks" or whatever.

You still pay for every kw/h, it's just you pay more than you use in the off-peak months, and less than you use during the peak months, and they keep a running tally.

My bill basically says things like "X kw/h at Y price" and says, say, 160 dollars." But I'd pay, say, 200. And at the bottom is has a running tally of how much extra I've paid (or how much I owe them, depending on the part of the year). If I cancel the contract, they basically either rebate or charge me the difference.

[ghost]

Sounds pretty gamble-ey for the electric company.

As far as I know we only have one choice in San Antonio-  CPS.

[IainC]

Sounds pretty gamble-ey for the electric company.

Not really because they recalculate your average periodically. If you've been overpaying then they send you a cheque and cut your payments, otherwise they increase your regular payment to cover the shortfall. When you move out they'll take a final reading and send you a bill for any outstanding balance.

[Merusk]

We do it here, too, for the inverse of Morat's reason.   It actually works out better for the electric & gas co.  because there's fewer people going "well shit, I can't pay that $1000 heating bill this month. I'll have to skip paying and hope I can cover it next month."  This isn't anecdotal, they've had interviews with Cinergy (now Duke) who said as much on local TV when they were trying to get more lower-income people on it.  Seems the higher-wage folks jumped all over it but those who it would actually benefit are suspicious of the program.

As for my phone thing. I'd looked at internet-based options before but decided I'd rather just pay the $30 a month for service that's reliable, connected to 911 and gives my address out when emergency services are called. (I've got kids, remember.)

[Morat20]

Sounds pretty gamble-ey for the electric company.

As far as I know we only have one choice in San Antonio-  CPS.

You don't. Go to PowertoChoose and it'll list everyone in your area code. CPS might be your grid provider -- ours is Centerpoint, IIRC. They handle the wires and whatnot. Reliant handles the power.

And no, it's not a gamble at all. They keep a running tally of your used kw/hs, and change your monthly bill every six months or so. They get every penny in the end. They just let you spread the payments out.

My monthly bill just dropped about 10%, mostly because over the last year I've cut my electricty usage some. (A little better discipline with the thermostat, rearranging a few things and some more efficient appliances). If I canceled my contract tomorrow, they'd owe me a hundred or two. If I canceled it in August or September, I'd owe THEM a couple of hundred -- since my summer bills are going to be higher than what I pay.

Fixed rates are actually a gamble -- although since I suspect they hedge them, not much of one -- since it's possible their wholesale energy purchases might exceed the costs they're charging customers on year-long or two-year long fixed rate plans.

But balanced billing? Like I said -- every kw/h is tracked and ultimately paid for. All you really do is run a balance or deficit during parts of the year.

[Merusk]

If you REALLY want to cut your bills, track-down all the "energy vampires" in your house, put them on a power strip and turn the strip off instead of the appliance.   That's a little extreme for me, but I did notice a $5 dip when I did it with just the DVD/TV/Cable box.  I imagine doing it with the PCs, router, printer and upstairs dvr/vhs would net me a pretty penny in savings.

[ghost]

You don't. Go to PowertoChoose and it'll list everyone in your area code. CPS might be your grid provider -- ours is Centerpoint, IIRC. They handle the wires and whatnot. Reliant handles the power.

But balanced billing? Like I said -- every kw/h is tracked and ultimately paid for. All you really do is run a balance or deficit during parts of the year.

Yeah, I don't have any other options in my zip code according to that site. 

As for the balanced billing I need to see if CPS does this.  I assume they do. 

[Morat20]

Yeah, I don't have any other options in my zip code according to that site. 

That's fucking weird. Hmm. I wonder about that. I don't know all the ins and outs of the process, but if you don't have competition I'd have to say your provider is probably still regulated for some reason.

As for the balanced billing I need to see if CPS does this.  I assume they do. 

It's a great little system for places with extreme temps in summer or winter. You have to accept early that if you cancel out of the contract, you might owe some money. Like for me? From about July through January I owe them money. Then they owe me until July.

[Yegolev]

Well, looks like I met my future ex-wife. Damn it.

Congratulations?

[ghost]

Yeah, I don't have any other options in my zip code according to that site. 

That's fucking weird. Hmm. I wonder about that. I don't know all the ins and outs of the process, but if you don't have competition I'd have to say your provider is probably still regulated for some reason.

As for the balanced billing I need to see if CPS does this.  I assume they do. 

It's a great little system for places with extreme temps in summer or winter. You have to accept early that if you cancel out of the contract, you might owe some money. Like for me? From about July through January I owe them money. Then they owe me until July.

Well, it is San Antonio, the Air Force capital of the US.  I don't know if that has anything to do with it or not.  San Antonio is a weird fucking place all around.  I still haven't gotten it figured out after being here a decade. 

[ghost]

Man, there's crazy weather out there today.   I hope Snakecharmer and Haemish and anyone else that might have been in the way of this stuff is okay. 

[SnakeCharmer]

Heh.  Thanks.  Unfortunately, we're right in the middle of it.  Came up to my folks house to spend a few days while my son was out of school for spring break.

Day 1 (Tuesday):  Arrive.  At the house for 3 hours.   My dad and my son come running back into the house.  Son's hand on his forehead, and it looks like a scene out of The Shining there is so_much_blood.  Tripped and fell while running in the backyard to get on the 4 wheeler trailer.  Forehead hits the only sharp area on the whole thing.  To the ER we go!  30 minute car ride because my parents live in BFE.  Wait 5 minutes (thank God nobody was in the ER), get triag'd, wait 5 more minutes to be taken to a room.  A doctor walks in and says 'oh suture' in a thick (guessing Vietnamese, his name was An Thang) accent and walks out.  Spent all of 3 seconds in the room.  They fit his arms in pillow case at his side/behind his back.  My dad holds his legs, a nurse basically lays on top of him, another nurse holds his head.  PA sews his head up.  The cut is about half the circumference of a quarter.  7 stiches outside.  2 inside. 

Day 2 (Wednesday):  Hear emergency sirens go off.  Walk out the upstairs patio from my parents bedroom, look northwest.  See tornado spooling around.  Run downstairs.  Power goes off.  Something like 3 more passed by within 5 minutes of my parents house in the span of 30 minutes according to the news.  All we have is a few downed trees/limbs and alot of debris in the yard.  

I don't even want to know what Day 3 brings.

[Lantyssa]

Hopefully blissful peace.

[Yegolev]

What sort of wind does it take to loft a three-inch ball of ice to 40k feet?

[rattran]

Scary, screamy wind based on last night. I'm looking forward to going home to the midwest where it seems safer from tornadoes than here in Georgia.

[RhyssaFireheart]

Hope all you being targetted by tornados stay safe and out of the way. 

Midwest isn't much better.  We're in flood mode atm, or so it seems and the tornados still come by every once in a while to visit.

[Sky]

All of central NY is in flood mode. I got caught in that crazy storm the other day with the hail and the tornados and flooding and whatnot. I was mostly hoping the FJ wouldn't get dinged up with hail, but marble-sized was the biggest I saw, though I heard there was golf ball-sized nearby. Was very thankful to have a vehicle built with fording streams in mind, had no issue driving home through streets that were extremely flooded, one was maybe a foot deep at the crown.

Looks like both my new honeycrisp trees pulled through, pushing a ton of nodes right now. Luckily they were sheltered by my house and some pines, the winds were vicious. Stocky little bastards, I got the pick of the litter this time.

[Lantyssa]

We're going on two months with only five minutes of rain.  Lots of wildfires in Texas, during Spring of all times.  I wish the weather would average itself out a bit.

[Merusk]

Floods I can deal with. I wasn't stupid enough to buy land in a low point or without looking at a flood map first.*  It's the tornadoes I worry about, being up on this hillock as I am.

 (The creeks near me would have to raise 40+ feet to block all egress routes from their "high" of 4' depth. At that point I think we can safely say everyone's fucked.)