[tehwebguy]

There are some interesting details here but let's be suuuper clear, nobody in the residential sector consented to a 12,000% increase in power costs or a $5,000 - $16,000 power bill this month. I think the article tries extremely hard to forgive everyone involved aside from the residents who have now been completely devastated by this.

The only real acknowledgement that residents have truly suffered something they didn't deserve is sandwiched between statements completely clearing Griddy & ERCOT of wrongdoing:

> The point is that while Griddy customers should definitely be entitled to relief, Griddy is not evil. Nor is ERCOT.

[techsupporter]

Exactly.

In my experience, there are exactly two types of customers on the kinds of plans like Griddy offers: a) people who are heavily into cost-optimization and have spent the cash to automate their living quarters to take advantage of wholesale price swings; and b) people who are trying to stretch a dollar because a single dollar is all they have left.

For people in that second category, the dollar broke and smacked them in the face.

I am by no means calling people stupid for doing this; they believed the sales pitch and either did not understand (because the wholesale pricing model is actually complex) or were not told the massive potential downsides. And when the cost of keeping where you live at a livable temperature runs into the mid-three-digits per month during the summer, you're going to jump at the idea of slashing that by two-thirds.

This is consent in the same way that clicking "agree" on a 15,000-word EULA is consent. It isn't.

[ahepp]

I used to have these guys (EDIT: energy dereg companies, not griddy specifically) knocking on my door regularly with a pen, asking me to sign a contract for real time pricing literally on the spot, because I could save a bunch of money on my bill

I would be shocked if there is any energy deregulation company that doesn't resort to this, because it's the basic result of hiring contractors and paying them on commission

[wnymls]

In NYC, back when movie theaters were open, all of the Regals and AMC had these variable rate energy companies setup tables near the machines where you buy tickets. Usually they were manned by 2 young people in their early 20s, possibly college students.

These promoters would aggressively advertise "Free $10 Regal Gift Cards" or "Free $10 AMC Gift Cards", on the spot. They would say there is no catch. All you need is to be a ConEd Customer.

Every household in NYC is a ConEd customer because it is the only electric company.

Then they give you a tablet, and have you sign into your ConEd account. What they don't tell you is that you are switching your ConEd bill to a variable rate energy provider. On average, your bill is actually higher per month.

Every time I went to the movies I saw dozens of people get conned into higher monthly bills in exchange for a $10 gift card. I highly doubt anyone that signed up knew what they were really signing up for.

In upstate New York, I recall door to door salesmen doing the same thing. In NYC, too many residents live in buildings so they setup in movie theaters instead.

I wonder what their deal was with the theater venues. Does Regal/AMC rent out floor space to these promoters, or is there a revenue sharing deal?

[fennecfoxen]

> knocking on my door regularly with a pen

How delightful! Here in New York we just have CleanChoice Power doing it via mail fraud.

(By "mail fraud" I mean that they do their best to dress it up as a something like power bill, except demanding a signature, to trick the unwary into signing it without reading.)

[paulgb]

Unfortunately energy deregulation seems to disproportionately attract hucksters. I had never heard of Griddy until recently but in NY we have our share of pushy firms with questionable sales.

Question for those in TX: was your perception of Griddy that they were sketchy, or just a get-what-you-pay-for sort of basic service? Did they aggressively sell door-to-door?

[ohyeshedid]

> Unfortunately energy deregulation seems to disproportionately attract hucksters.

Deregulation does that in lots of markets, if not all of them. Paying via commissions does the same.

[paulgb]

Yes, I think especially so in industries the average person doesn’t understand well, like electricity spot markets.

[majormajor]

The existence of hucksters is a big part of why regulation is created in the first place.

If you have to "de"regulation something, ask why it was regulated in the first place!

[cameronh90]

We have energy privatisation in the UK and I've never experienced any hucksters. Indeed, I've had a very good experience with the small start-up energy providers compared to the big pre-privatisation firms.

I would guess there are different types of deregulation. We still have a regulatory body that ensures the market and new private entrants are operating effectively.

[makomk]

I'm guessing you're not the target market. The UK energy market has a huge huckster problem - sleazy door-to-door salesmen and cold callers tricking people who don't know better into switching their energy plans without realizing that's what they're signing up for, even outright faking signatures in some cases.

[NovemberWhiskey]

"Consented" in the sense of "agreed to a legal contract that permitted that outcome" or in the sense of "anticipated at the time they signed up to the contract that this was an outcome they would experience"?

[tehwebguy]

I mean "consented" as far as a human being ever consents. If you ask me to give you a "high five" every day, but then suddenly one day you coat your hand with JB Weld before the high five without telling me and we have to be surgically separated that wasn't consent in any meaningful sense.

[cwhiz]

It’s always someone else’s fault. If you signed up for Griddy and didn’t know what you were getting into, that’s your fault. If you signed up for Griddy and knew the risks, that’s your fault. Either way, it’s your fault.

Griddy wasn’t some shady operation that hid the downside risks. Their customers were encouraged to monitor the real time rates and use electricity when it was cheap. The week before the storm Griddy was frantically trying to terminate accounts.

Is this entire country allergic to personal responsibility?

[ghaff]

When people consent to variable rates, absent a cap they're making at least implicit assumptions about the likelihood and magnitude of rate spikes. By and large, people don't hedge variable rate loans, fuel oil prices (although some do), power rates, etc. But people (reasonably) assume that variable rate loan isn't going to spike to 50% interest some night. But as you say, I'm pretty sure that no one signing up for one of these plans imagined a 100x spike in their monthly electrical bill was a possibility.

[thinkcontext]

They chose to risk the possibility of unlimited prices. They chose to abandon agents that would hedge against price spikes. They pocketed the money they "saved" and chose not to insure themselves against this possibility.

We have been subjected to sneering lectures from Texans and libertarians about the nanny state, socialist bureaucrats, freedom killing regulation, Venezuela, the Great Leap Forward and on and on. I'd suggest Texans kick such politicians out of government and replace them with ones that have advocated for sane policies PRIOR to this event.

[ahepp]

Serious question, how many of them even knew what the hell they signed up for?

My experience with these companies is that they'll just walk door to door with a pen telling you to sign on the dotted line to save a bunch of money.

I doubt most of the people hurt by this are true believers, or even had a basic understanding of the arrangement.

[bradleyjg]

Where do they think that the money is coming from to enable them to come out so far ahead and pay people to walk around with clipboards too?

[thinkcontext]

If they were deceived they have recourse.