Business Customers being served by one of the Connecticut Utilities (CPL, UI) are given many options now that the Connecticut electricity market has been fully deregulated.  Most offers that come from certified retail electric providers involve a certain fixed price per KWh set for a certain term.

Another option that exists for businesses is a floating wholesale index rate.  The index rate allows business customers to buy power for the posted wholesale electric price plus a small retail adder by the retail provider.  These rates have averaged below $0.09 per KWh compared to utility default rates of $0.1247 (28%) and competitive fixed rates of $0.105 (14%).  The wholesale index prices for Connecticut are posted and updated in real time at http://www.iso-ne.com/ which is the Regional Transmission Organization for New England.  The retail adder amount would be stated in a contract between a retail electric provider and the business customer.

Many large businesses who have the resources to educated themselves on all the benefits of electricity deregulation have been using index pricing to their advantage for several years.  Small and medium size businesses have the option to use index pricing as well with many of the competitive suppliers, however most suppliers do not spend time marketing the product because they feel that it will be too complicated for the average small business owner to understand.

If you are a small business owner who would like more information on index pricing, leave a comment on this article and we can provide you some literature and historic numbers on index wholesale electricity pricing.