First Choice Power review: Fraud, bad company practices ( 3 comments)

First Choice Power has been our electricity provider for a year as of June 2008, we paid around .142kw/hr with them for that year. When July's bill came around they increased it to .185. August went up to .251, in June we looked into changing companies, filled out the application online with YEP Energy. We found them through powertochoose.com. For some reason, YEP said they didn't have any information in their system on us, so I filled out the information again on 09/02/08, I believe. ERCOT sent us a notice dated 09/05/08 that YEP had placed an order to become our new service provider, and if that wasn't correct, we had the right to cancel. Then, yesterday, AEP, the ones who physically come and hook and disconnect service, came to our house and disconnected our service, stating that we requested the disconnect. Then we called First Choice, they said that they sent out a disconnect notice on 08/14/08 to us, we never received a disconnect notice! We have a physical bill that was sent to us with a total on it that was due on 09/12/08, and that day hasn't even come yet. There was nothing on that bill about us oweing any money, or about us being disconnected. My husband made the mistake of paying the bill, without getting them to renegotiate the rate (.251), so for 1300 kw, we paid around $370! They then proceeded to tell him, right after he paid, that we are no longer a customer of theirs, and they cannot help us anymore. They then also told us that they disconnected us because we were switching companies. There is not supposed to be any interruption in service when switching companies, and for sure, they are not supposed to come and physically disconnect our service. We did nothing to deserve this, and someone is going to have to pay for the mistake! This is simply ridiculous! I am filing on First Choice Power with the Better Business Bureau, and asking for our money back on the last bill. We don't know whose fault it is, so it is hard to find someone to blame, but we will get retribution. YEP had to have received our information and sent something over to First Choice, for them to know that we were even planning on switching companies. We are also not going with YEP in case it was their fault, we have chosen Commerce Energy, and I hope they can get us turned on by today! Who knows, but do not go with FIrst Choice!