JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — JEA customers will see lower fuel charges for the month of November, which could lower overall electric bills, but it won’t last for long
“Just fuel costs, $1200 bucks," said Del Angelo, who saw his fuel charge quadruple this year.
That's how much Del Angelo has spent so far this year on JEA fuel costs.
He says the fee nearly quadrupled, from $54 in January to $210 last month. That cost is on top of the fees for electricity usage, water and sewage.
“This just seemed, way out of line, I expect there’s going to be fuel costs…but when it went to $210 just for the fuel, I didn’t feel comfortable with that," Angelo said.
Since December, the rate has been steadily increasing, going from about $36 to $79 in October.
JEA CEO Jay Stowe says the fluctuations are due to the JEA's Board of Directors charging the fuel rate monthly instead of annually. He says they do this to keep up with real-time energy costs
“If we had kept that system as it was, then our fuel charges would have been higher over the last year than they are now," said Jay Stowe, CEO of JEA. "So we’ve been able to better serve our customers more transparently serve our customers with the method that we’ve used now."
Leaders expect a drop in fuel charges for the month of November BUT Stowe says as long as the war in Ukraine continues, the price of fuel will continue to fluctuate.
"As long as the war in Ukraine is going on and there’s other pressures outside of our control, then it’s going to be a little bit of pressure on our fuel charge and we’re going to manage that the best way we can," Stowe said. "And we see some slight changes over the next few months and then next spring we see it dropping back down again."
Making it hard for people like Angelo to budget.
“I can’t change my income, I’m working, I’m retired but still working. You just deal with it," Angelo said.
To help customers with high bills, JEA is no longer charging fees for the use of a credit or debit card to pay your bill.
Customers who have good payment histories are now able to get refunds of their start-service deposits after 12 months instead of 24 months.
A new fuel rate page has been added to JEA.com letting customers know expected fuel charges for future months.