As a resident of Ohio, I have only one choice when it comes to who provides my electrical service: Ohio Edison. Recently, my parents changed the name that their account was under... the account that has been serving the same people at the same house with the same service for 25 years. All that was changed was the name. The service was not stopped and started again, new people did not move into the house.... nothing changed. Yet, this month, we are paying 6.3 cents per kWh as opposed to last month when we were paying 3.4 cents per kWh. What that equals is a $530 bill for one month, as opposed to a $250 bill for the month before. More than double! How are we to pay this? There was no warning. There was advance notice. Nothing written on paper that we agreed to pay this new amount. And, whereas normally, we would simply ditch this service and go to a competitor for a better rate, we don't even have that option! We spent many hours on the phone with different managers representing Ohio Edison, to no avail. They have us backed into a corner and they know it. There are no choices for us other than to pay the bill, or go without electricity. And, no electricity for us means no water, as we have a well that is run by an electric pump. We literally have zero options. I've written to my congressman and senators, but really, are they even going to hear me? An extra $250 a month is not something you just come up with out of thin air. I suppose this will help teach us to conserve as much energy as we can... live in the dark... go without air conditioning (we should be doing that anyway, I know)...cook on the grill....

What is the answer? Any ideas would be greatly helpful! (Oh, and we already set up a budget plan with the power company and have tried to get some sort of discounted rate or assistance, but to no avail.)

Help!