Hidden Utility Charges Are Undermining Energy Freedom—and Costing You More

When you open your electric bill, you expect to pay for the power you use and the wires that deliver it. What you probably don’t expect is to help cover someone else’s energy losses—especially when those losses come from an investor owned utility.

Unfortunately, that’s exactly what’s happening right now in New Hampshire.

Multiple utilities are asking the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to approve backdoor fees that will quietly shift millions of dollars in losses from their default energy supply service and flaws in their billing and load settlement systems onto all electric customers—whether you’re actually using their supply or not.

Unitil is seeking to recover nearly $700,000 in under-collected supply costs by adding them to the Stranded Cost Charge on everyone’s bill.  Eversource, which serves a far larger customer base, is going even further—seeking to recover more than $6.5 million in default supply losses through a similar charge.

Both utilities are also requesting distribution rate increases in separate PUC proceedings, which could raise average monthly electric bills for households by $10 to $15 or more, and far more for small businesses and manufacturers.

For a small café in Manchester, that might mean an extra $600 to $1,000 a year in utility costs. For a manufacturing facility in Hooksett, it could mean substantially more.

Worst of all, these Stranded Cost Charges are not optional and that means even if you’ve made the choice to shop for a better rate, go solar, or join your town’s Community Power program—you still pay.

New Hampshire’s pioneering Electric Utility Restructuring law envisioned a competitive energy market where customers are “King” and have maximum freedom and autonomy over their energy supply. That law was passed to lower costs, promote innovation, and protect consumers from monopoly utilities. But that promise is being eroded.

When utilities are allowed to lowball their rates, lose money, and then pass those losses onto everyone through hidden delivery fees, they’re gaming the system. It’s like a supermarket slashing prices to beat out local competitors, losing money on every item, and then billing every shopper in town—even those who didn’t walk through their doors.

It’s a dangerous precedent. It creates an uneven playing field where no one—not Community Power programs, not private suppliers—can compete.

In the long term, these tactics discourage innovation and private investment in new local energy solutions. It risks driving competitive entities out of the market, leaving consumers with fewer choices and higher prices.

New Hampshire residents and businesses deserve a level playing field, predictable rate structures, and the freedom to shop for better energy deals. These proposals threaten all three.

We need greater transparency. Every dollar on our electric bill should be traceable to a service, not buried in bureaucratic math. The people of New Hampshire deserve to know why their bills are rising—and who is benefiting.

Our coalition—made up of more than 60 cities, towns, and counties across New Hampshire—was created to give communities and customers more control over their energy decisions. We pool buying power to offer competitive rates, reinvest savings into local projects, and give residents and businesses more options. Since launching in April 2023, we’ve helped save customers more than $20 million on their utility bills.

If these utility proposals are approved, that progress could be undone.

We urge the Public Utilities Commission to reject these cost-shifting schemes and let utilities recover their costs from the customers who incurred them—not from captive ratepayers through hidden surcharges.

Deana Dennis is a resident of Manchester and serves as the Director of Regulatory & Legislative Affairs at the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire (CPCNH), a non-profit Joint Powers Agency governed “by communities, for communities.

*While Eversource originally sought cost recovery for the $6.5 million in losses through their Stranded Cost Recovery Charge, they recently changed course after expert testimony from the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire uncovered the true causes of the losses which was errors in their IT systems. On May 13, the PUC ordered that the proposal be transferred to another Eversource rate docket.