The base charge is a flat monthly fee per meter and is not dependent on how much energy is used. All HCEC members need a reliable energy grid, so members all share the costs of building and maintaining it through the base charge.
Even if your lights are not turned on, HCEC provides all the materials and maintenance needed to power your home or business. To recover those costs, HCEC must pass them along through the base charge. The base charge is fairly distributed across the entire membership based on each member's class of service.
Recovering our fixed costs appropriated through the base charge reduces our risk of being dependent on weather extremes and allows us to collect our real costs of service each and every month. This approach also provides our members with greater consistency and fairness in monthly billing. Members can be confident that they are paying their "fair share" for their particular class of service.
