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- How to read your bill -

If you’re like most people, you probably don’t give a second thought to your bill’s itemized charges, merely glancing at the total figure, paying it, and getting on with your life. But even if you did take the time to study the invoice, would you understand what each section means?

There are plenty of benefits to taking a closer look at your energy bill. You can learn how much electricity you use each month, view the breakdown of charges, and compare the prior month’s energy use to recognize patterns. Getting familiar with your bill is especially useful if you’re looking to conserve energy and lower your bill. To find out more about your bill and how to decipher it, we broke down the main sections you’ll want to look at next month.

Statement Date: The information found in the upper right corner is relevant to understanding your bill because we bill in roughly 30-day increments for electricity already consumed.

Account Number: Your account number can be found on the top right corner of your bill and is your key to billing and member support. This number is vital when signing up for an online account or downloading the Cass County Electric mobile app. The mobile app provides numerous account management benefits and in-depth consumption analytics.

Important Messages: This section will contain important information regarding your bill, along with useful tips from Cass County Electric.

Service Information: Your location, address, and rate class (RC) are located here. This is the location where you will find the dates of service being billed, along with your meter reading(s).

kWh Usage History: This charge makes up the bulk of your bill. You can use this chart to view prior months’ energy usage and track fluctuations – such as usage increases during the winter and summer. These comparisons over the past year include the number of days in the billing period, average costs, temperatures, and kilowatt-hours (kWh).

Details of Charges:

Basic Charge: This is a fixed monthly connection charge that helps recover the cooperative’s fixed costs of serving a member.

Energy Charges: These charges represent the cost of the electricity you used in the last billing cycle. They include both a kWh charge and purchased power adjustment.

kWh Charge: The cost of power you used plus the costs to deliver power, measured in kilowatt-hours. To calculate energy charges, multiply your rate (unit cost) by your usage (quantity).

Purchased Power Adjustment: This charge accounts for the variable cost in wholesale power.

Other Charges and Credits: This area includes all additional charges and credits. Here is where you will see your monthly donation to the Operation Round Up program. The average yearly per-member contribution averages less than $6 a year.

Also included in this section are franchise fee charges. Several cities have imposed franchise fees on the cooperative that are passed through to the member, collected by the cooperative, and dispersed directly to those cities. Franchise fees can be a way to help the town offset future property tax or special assessment increases.

Other miscellaneous charges or credits found in this section may include renewable energy credits from Prairie Sun Community Solar, demand waiver, connect and disconnect fees, deposits, credits for going paperless or signing up for autopay, and more.

Remittance Slip: Paying by mail? Be sure to include the bottom portion of your bill with the appropriate side facing out. Current contact information is the key to receiving automated outage information and essential account alerts. Download the Cass County Electric mobile app to manage your account settings, billing preferences, report outages, set usage thresholds and alerts, and more.