PSO Suggests Saving Money By Spending Money

So American Electric Power - AKA - Public Service Company of Oklahoma - AKA - PSO - AKA - the electric company has a new twist on saving money on your utility bill... Spend it elsewhere. I'm not even joking, even though I'm laughing. Here's the full story.

So a few years ago, after talking with people to see just how much they've benefited from PSO's Power Hours program, I decided it would be a good program for me. You see, you pay a lesser rate from 7pm-2pm the following day, and a little more than double from 2pm-7pm during what they call "Peak Time." That's generally when the sun bakes homes during the heat of the day. Add on top of that, 4pm-7pm is the average time most people get home, cool off the house, start a load of laundry, cook dinner, and generally consume a bulk of their electricity. Simple supply and demand means that if everyone is wanting power at the same time, they have to crank up the plant to produce energy, and anything that isn't used is wasted of into the electricians purgatory. So to encourage using your electricity at a less demanded time, they give you a break on the cost. Makes sense to me.

From time to time, PSO will send out emails full of sometimes useful information about how to prevent using power during that expensive period. This latest time around, their advice of how to save money on the electric bill is to go out to dinner and a movie. There's no punchline, that's literally their advice of how to save money on your electric bill. Really drives home a saying I hear all the time... Pinch penneys, lose dollars. I can't believe someone got paid to write that advice.