Choosing A Company to Audit Your Utilities?

7 Questions You Must Ask!

1. How do you analyze our utility bill costs?
   The key here is that the utility rules are open to interpretation. The gray areas within the regulations are the guideposts to uncovering hidden savings. Simply entering data onto a software program and doing a spreadsheet comparison won’t do the complete job. You want utility detectives who really dig inside the rules, not data entry clerks.
    
2. How long have your analysts been in the utility bill auditing business?
   Even where companies have been in existence for a number of years, the actual work may be done by someone without much experience. Another person might give a perfunctory look afterwards, but do you really want somebody learning on your job?
    
3. Do you strictly analyze costs, or are you selling other services, such as installing energy efficiency equipment, bill paying, or energy procurement?
   Some companies make their real money by selling energy efficiency equipment, purchase energy on a wholesale basis, or offer bill paying services. A utility audit is given as part of the package, sometimes for free. Ask yourself that if they are being compensated in other areas, how much time will they spend analyzing your bills? Will they just look for the obvious "low hanging fruit", or go further?
    
4. What utilities do you analyze?
   The reason for this question is that many utility bill auditing companies will only analyze gas and electric rates. Why? It’s because gas and electric rates apply to wide geographical areas, even entire states. Often, significant savings can be found with water and sewage costs. Many utility auditing companies don’t review water and sewage costs because each municipality has its own rules and this involves more research.
    
5. How do you verify the utility bill savings?
   This is very important. You need to be aware of their process and procedures so that you have proper validation.
    
6. What does your company do to monitor regulatory changes?
   Rates and utility schedules change, and it’s important to keep current. You need to know what the company will be doing to be a watchdog on your behalf.
    
7. How long will the utility bill audit take?
   Some companies pride themselves on their rapid turn-around. The work is done in a matter of weeks. Sounds good, but they’re generally looking for only the most obvious errors. The more thorough the work, the more research is involved, and that extra time can often pay big dividends. It’s the difference between an assembly line operation and one which is custom designed.

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