Are you scared to open your electric bill? Completely confused about what you owe — and why? You’re not alone.
Electric prices have surged across Indiana. Residents statewide pay about 19% more for the same amount of electricity as they did three years ago. But bills are complicated, and it can be hard to understand all the charges you’re supposed to pay.
About three out of every four Hoosiers get their power from five investor-owned utilities. They are all regulated by the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission, but their bills look different because some use different terms or bundle charges in different ways.
To find out the specific terms on your bill, you can look at utility published guides: AES Indiana, CenterPoint Energy, Duke Energy Indiana, Indiana Michigan Power and NIPSCO.
Here’s an FPI News guide to Indiana electric bills — from the basics to the opaque charges.
The basics
💸 Amount due
If you just want to know what you are supposed to pay this month, look for the amount due. For CenterPoint, that shows up on the top right corner, at the bottom of the account summary and on the payment slip.
🔌 Current electric charges
That’s how much you owe for the current billing period. That amount might be different than the monthly charges if you over- or underpaid in prior months.
🟰 Levelized billing
The monthly electric charges and the amount due could also be different for customers on levelized or budget billing plans.
With levelized billing, you pay extra during temperate periods when you don’t use as much electricity, and you pay less during months when you use more, like air-conditioning season.
⚠️ But be cautious: If the total payments add up to less than what you owe for the period, you could be hit with a larger bill to make up the difference.
🆘 Energy assistance
Some low-income residents get help paying for heat and electric bills through the federally funded energy assistance program.
Energy assistance applications are currently closed, but they will reopen in the fall. The program is administered locally. The state lists who to contact for assistance in each county online.
🏭 Facilities or connection charge
This amount remains consistent each month, even if you don’t use much power.
🏛️ State sales tax
Nothing exciting here — Indiana collects 7% sales tax on electric bills.
The ‘tracker’ charges
Most of your electric bill is determined by the base rate. Those rates are set in cases that go before the state regulatory commission every few years, and they get lots of media attention.
But bills also fluctuate more frequently because of changes to what are called trackers. Those are specific charges, also approved by regulators, for things like environmental compliance or fuel costs. They may actually lower your bill in some cases — like if natural gas used to generate power is unexpectedly cheap.
You can find a snapshot of the trackers for each investor-owned electric company in the utility commission’s annual July 1 survey of electric bills.
⛽ Fuel charges
All five utilities have a tracker for fuel that impacts what you pay.
This charge is broken out on some utility bills. But others don’t itemize fuel costs.
🧾 Other…
Utilities have a lot of other trackers. Duke Energy, for example, breaks down the charges in detail, but most bills are less transparent. CenterPoint bundles most trackers in a line called “adjustments.” AES doesn’t itemize them at all.
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FPI News reporter Dylan Peers McCoy covers pressing issues throughout the state and how local communities are tackling those challenges. Reach her at 508-259-4809 or dylan.mccoy@fpinews.org.
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