Differences between variable rate and fixed rate

You can buy natural gas & electricity for your home or business as variable rate, fixed-rate or even prepaid.

Fixed rate – The fixed rate gas & electricity are sold by energy retailers. The fixed rate is a gamble because no one knows if the price of natural gas or electricity will go up or down. However, the fix rate contract gives you the benefit of knowing your gas and electricity costs are set for that period. If price rise above your contract price, you benefit.

Also fixed rate are unregulated, which mean the energy retailers can charge whatever they want for your natural gas and electricity.

Variable rate – The variable rate for natural gas and electricity are regulated. It comes from your utility supplier, such as Enbridge in Ontario or Nicor in Illinois. They can only profit from the delivery cost. The price of variable rate is determined by supply and demand, just like the fluctuation price on gasoline we use to fuel our cars.

Do you know what industries get the most consumer complaints in Ontario throughout 2009?

Well, the Ontario government released their yearly “top 10″ most consumer complaints report at the Ministry of Consumer Services’ website. See the page here.

Each year the Ontario government will release this to the public and in 2009 the top 10 most consumer complaints are:

On July 22, 2010 – Direct Energy a natural gas and electricity supplier is offering their first prepaid electricity plan. This new service will allow anyone with good or bad credit to sign-up with Direct Energy’s new plan.

The current prepaid rate for electricity is 10.8 cents per kilowatt-hour, which is cheaper than other prepaid electricity plans but higher if you have good credit.

With the new digital meter, which updates the current electricity usage of your home, Direct Energy will use it to accurately measure the amount of electricity used. When the prepaid customers max-out their balance, the electricity will automatically cut off. The customer will be able to add more money and with new payment the electricity will be turn back on within a few hours.

Did you know for the past three years since 2007, gas and electricity retailers made the “top 10 list” of all consumer complaints in Ontario? The Ontario Energy Board (OEB) receive about 100-150 complaints each week for the past three years.

Many consumer complaints against gas and electricity retailers were from door-to-door sale, high cancelation fee, misleading, deceptive marketing, and contract issue.

On December 8, 2009, the Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure from the McGuinty Government proposed new protections for gas and electricity consumers. This consumer act is called “PROPOSED ENERGY CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT( ECPA), 2009″.

Enbridge is now offering up to $250 dollars in rebates for Ontario residents to switch their home heating and water heating to natural gas before September 30, 2010.

Ontario residents can take advantage of the three following rebates when switching their natural gas supplier to Enbridge starting from June 15, 2010 through September 30, 2010 by buying, renting and installing:

On June, 17 2010, The Ontario Energy Board fine Summit Energy $495,000 for what it calls unfair practices in the sale of natural gas and electricity contracts.

Five Summit Energy agents made deceptive statements to consumers or failed to deliver written copies of the gas and electricity contracts within 40 days of signing, as required by law, the board said – pinpointing 28 incidents of such behavior. Read more at www.thestar.com Energy seller faces fine for misleading sales claims

Gerry Haggarty is the president of Summit Energy made this statement after the OEB charges: implemented of series of measures which included the suspension of all five sales agents noted in the OEB notice. Read it all at www.newswire.ca Summit Energy takes action to assist consumers

What you don’t know about Rebecca MacDonald
Here is a short profile and bio:

• One of the richest women in Canada
• Executive Chair of Just Energy Income Fund (TSX: JE.UN) formerly Energy Savings Income Fund, read more about Just Energy
• Born in Yugoslavia, 1953
• Her Yugoslavia name was Ubavka Mitic
• The Attorney General Illinois charged her company for consumer fraud and made her paid $1 million in consumer restitution. Read more at www.illinoisattorneygeneral.gov
• The Attorney General New York filed complaint about her company using deceiving tactics. Read more at www.ag.ny.gov
• Citizens Utility Board (CUB), AARP Illinois, and Citizen Action Illinois file complaint against her company. Read more at www.chicagobusiness.com
• $90,000 fine by Illinois Commerce Commission (ICC) and order audit on her company. Read more at www.icc.illinois.gov

“This company (Just Energy) is engaged in the worst kind of consumer fraud, preying on people’s fears of rising natural gas bills and resorting to deception in order to boost sales.” said Citizens Utility Board’s Executive Director David Kolata.

In 1974, at 22 years old she migrated on her own to Toronto, Canada. In 1979, she married Pearson MacDonald and changed her name to Rebecca MacDonald. Pearson MacDonald had a water filtration business and sale his products door-to-door.

I’m not a big fan with religions. I don’t bother with it and now it is starting to bother me particularly Islam and the violence teaching of the Quran. As I read more about this religion online I’m starting to get fed up with it. Take a good look at what Muslims are doing around the world under the name of their god Allah and under Islam as their religion. Then decide for yourself if Islam is a real religion of peace or something Muslims do to hind behind.

Read below, these are just some of the articles I found (only 10 min. of searching this religion online) about Muslims and Islam:

If you can’t afford a Mac or Windows and looking for other alternative. Well, Linux Ubuntu is free, stable, fast, more secure with less viruses and malware. Also the applications that runs on Ubuntu are free, open source programs and allow you to run some Microsoft programs.

Although Ubuntu is free, which is great but you should also check out its pros and cons. Here are some of our observations of the pros and cons of Ubuntu in no particular order.

If you play video games, or want something compatible with MS Office, it is going to be Windows. For creating designs, producing creative work, or producing content, perhaps go with OSX. If you are on a budget, need a fast, powerful, stable system, go with Linux.

Linux has its pros and cons, it is up to you to decide if Linux fit your need or not. Below are the pros and cons for the average users’ point of view.