Every now and then, something happens that changes a home’s or business’ use of electricity. New appliances, short-circuits, tripped circuit-breakers, water leaks, flooded basements or other mishaps can cause an unexpected higher or lower electric bill.
 
For years, Eastern Maine Electric’s online account manager, SmartHub, has provided a lot of useful information when that happens. SmartHub records hourly and daily usage, and the Co-op makes the data available online through a web browser or smart device. This service has been available for years now, and it has helped members track and modify their energy use.
 
Eastern Maine Electric now offers a free additional tool for members monitoring their electricity use. With usage alerts, members can receive alerts by email or text the next day after usage changes. The alerts are generated once each day, just before noon, based on the previous day’s meter readings.

Early Warning of Increased or Decreased Usage
Setting a usage alert can give members early warning that usage has changed, long before they receive their next monthly bill. 

For example, a member may think they have buttoned up the camp for winter, but on a weekend hunting trip, someone uses a space heater and forgets to turn it off when they leave, causing unexpected energy use. A usage alert can warn  a member before they receive a bill with unexpected higher usage.

Or maybe you have been carefully turning off lights and turning down the heat to save energy. If others in your home are not being as careful, usage alerts can help you recognize that something is being left on. Examining the hourly usage history on SmartHub can give you more clues about the cause.

The water heater tank in someone’s basement may have sprung a leak. Hot water could then be quietly leaking into a hidden corner of the basement. The water heater would be working overtime, but the heat energy would be wasted. A usage alert can save time finding the problem; otherwise, the first sign of trouble may be the next electric bill.

Most of the time, members only worry about increases in consumption, but a decrease can also be a sign of trouble. Returning to that buttoned-up camp in the first example, the homeowner may have space heaters set to keep the pipes from freezing. If the heaters trip a circuit breaker, the owner might get early warning, if he or she has set a low-usage threshold and alert.

While the word “alert” may be dramatic, getting a usage alert means only that your energy use has crossed one of the thresholds you set up. You may find that the cause was a heat wave, a cold snap, or some other temporary impact on energy use.

Setting a Threshold:
How many kWhs is too many or too few?

While many people measure the size of their electric bills in dollars, Usage alerts are based on kiloWatt-hours (kWhs). When setting a daily usage threshold, then, how many kWhs is too many?

The best place to start is with your past usage, which you can find on a recent bill or online through Smart Hub. With past usage in mind, the threshold you pick will depend on your reason for setting up a usage alert.

For those who want early warning of increased usage, there is a relatively simple method for calculating a starting threshold. 

For this example, the Usage History at the top of page 2 shows sample monthly usage for a year.
Find the kWhs used in the past year’s highest-use month.
 (March: 1923 kWhs)

Divide the monthly usage by the number of days in the billing period. Round up to a whole number. 
(1,923 kWhs ÷ 28-day billing period = 69)

Multiply that month’s average daily usage by 110 % (round up) to get your threshold.
(69 X 110% = 76)

In this example, a usage alert with a threshold of 76 kWhs/day would send an email and/or text when a day’s usage was over that threshold. Crossing that threshold would not necessarily mean something was wrong-- only that your daily use was higher than expected. An examination of SmartHub’s hourly readings may provide clues about what is going on.  

The Usage Alert can be a helpful tool, but it does not provide useful data in every situation, including:    
those 24-hour periods in which there has been a power outage, because the reading cycle is disrupted. 
for Net Energy Billing (NEB) accounts, because usage alerts are hard to set up for power that is flowing in two directions.

Usage alerts are only a tool, intended to help members who are concerned about their energy use. Should a technical issue prevent usage alerts from being sent, billing usage would still be based on the final reading taken each month and reflected on the bill itself.

For questions or assistance, contact Eastern Maine Electric’s Billing Department at (800) 696-7444, menu option 2.