Why is my energy bill so stupid high?

Estimates are just that. I get similar estimated electric bills between meter readings; several times a year the estimates are adjusted, both up and down. Call your electric company and ask how often someone comes to read the meter and whether your apt. has its own. (You don’t mean “energy” bill, do you?)

Thanks @gailcalled. And yeah I meant electricity.

$60 is high when that’s more than your food budget, so I was just a little shocked.

I heat my house with electricity and have long cold winters. This year my monthly budget is higher than @livelaughlove21.‘s I do try to be careful but I live alone and don’t have to nag anyone.

As @gailcalled has noted, estimated bills are rough approximations of what a bill for a user in your circumstances would normally incur. Since you’re a lighter-than-usual user of electric power, your actual usage – as you noted – will generally be less than the average user’s. So in this case the estimated bill is high, and when the reconciliation is performed after an actual meter reading, you’ll get credit for the overpayments that you make now.

You might talk to the power company and see about being put on a “budget plan”, where a uniform amount is billed every month, and then reconciled at the end of the year, up or down, depending on whether you exceeded the plan’s usage or used less power than expected.

Your bill might be low compared to others, but any bill that doubles in price in one month is worthy of being considered “stupid high.”

Give your electric company a call as @CWOTUS suggested. They should be able to work with you to make you bill more budget friendly.

Do you live in a cold climate? Is there a chance an electric heater turned on?

Around here they guesstimate power usage and only read the meters quarterly. It’s no mistake that they overestimate on purpose. You’ll probably get an extra low bill in the next read cycle somewhere when they look at your actual usage if that’s what they are doing. You can probably just call and find out if that’s the case. It’s basically like giving the power company an interest free loan. It’s still not really affecting you that much over the course of a year though.

Can’t you submit meter readings online? They will still send someone round to check from time to time but it keeps it accurate in the meantime.

I know where I lived before, SA, they used to do readings every 3 months. So, the bill was low for two months then much higher. I also used to find it odd since I lived pretty much like you do. Now I am in Scotland and my old bill seems paltry to this one. I pay around £70 per month. Whereas in SA (hot there) I paid about £19 equivalent. The worse part was that, my heating and hot water was not working for around six months of my living here. I suspect the high bill which is now been stretched over the year at £70 gas/elec was due to the faulty boiler firing up over and over and no heat coming out.

That meant my first winter in UK was extremely depressing! What I can suggest is that you can phone in and give them accurate readings of your meter each month. That way avoiding a bigger cost quarterly.

My electricity meter used to be read every two months, the other month was an estimate, calculated on the amount of electricity I used in that month the previous year. Several months ago the power company installed a smart meter which is read remotely so every account is an accurate account, it’s a great system except for the fact that lots and lots of meter readers lost their job.

Estimates are usually based on your average usage the year before or in the last 12 months. It sounds like you just moved, so maybe they estimate on what the previous tennant usually used? I don’t know for sure.

@LuckyGuy If it is an estimate it wouldn’t matter if he left something on I don’t think. He isn’t being billed on actual usage.

You could call your utility company and have them check your meter or try to explain your usage. I can’t imagine having a $10 energy bill. We don’t know where you live in the world, do you live in an apt or home? Are you all electric or does this include gas too? Smarter to contact your energy company than to ask such a general question with no detail.

Actually you guys did answer my question. I live in an apartment and am pretty obsessive about only using what I truly need even if its less convienent.

They used to estimate ours as well, usually every other month and sometimes they got it right, sometimes wrong.
Now they have installed meters that transmit the usage data automatically so they no longer have to play that game.

@hug_of_war Did you call the utility company to see what can be done about it? I guess if you pay it, you probably won’t have another thing to pay for two months if they finally read your meter. I dont know where you live, but a lot of the US is entering a time of year where utility usage is low.

I think @JLeslie‘s first answer was spot-on. If it’s only your second month in the apartment and they are estimating, it is based on the previous users bill at that address. If you’re not overly short of money, then just pay it and when they do an actual read again, you probably won’t owe at all.

I have had this exact thing happen when I moved before.

An update -

You guys were right, they do the actual reading every other month so in August I paid $10, in September $60, and I have a bill of -$28 for October.