Star Energy Partners

Taylor Shutt

A few months ago two sales reps came to my door. After a week or two having these people come to my apartment I gave in and decided to see what they wanted. They told me they worked for Duke Energy and needed to see my bill to make sure I was “updated with the new supplier charges”. They told me duke was changing to renewable energy and that they needed to make sure my bill reflected the “correct” suppliers. I was caught off guard and immediately felt like something was not right, knowing that if something needed to be changed I would have received a letter or a phone call, not someone coming to my door. HOWEVER I am a single mom and was home by myself with my toddler son and just wanted these people to leave me alone. The sales reps were very pushy and basically laid everything out like I had to do it because everyone was switching over to renewable energy and if I didn’t “correct” my bill, I would be overpaying. These people actually had me close my door and answer a phone call and answer questions to switch to this supplier, and when I was done I had to let them know and they would leave. It took a couple of months to reflect on my bill because something happened and Duke was not up to date with my new supplier. Now that it has caught up my bill has TRIPLED. I knew it would get higher seeing as we are in the summer months, but my bill is outrageous. In the end I feel as though I was harassed and pressured into switching to something that has tripled my bill when they told me it would be lower. Do not answer the door for these people. I am going to be contacting Duke Energy and figuring out how to cancel.

Chuck Gephart

I received a call today from star energy partners informing me that I signed up for a 3 year contract which I didn't. I did sign up for an apparent 9 month plan at which time upon plan expiring the company rather than contacting you to discuss options feels the need to automatically enroll you in a 3 year plan, customer rep today informed me I signed for this, which I didn't. Company also decides to charge its customers a customer service charge of 16.50 per month that's an additional 200 per year for the right to lock in a rate which is a total RIP off. I am in contact with the local public utilities commission. These crooks better not even try charging early termination fees People beware of predator companies because they only tell you what you want to hear not what the disadvantages are.

Cynthia Liu

Very disappointed with the Star Energy Partners Service. Would not recommend others to sign up for this third party supplier. I was assured that I would be saving money and utilizing green energy, but it actually doubled my utilities bill per month especially with the 50 cent service charge per day. They really should consider how many people and how much power is being used on average per month in a residence before offering this service. Their tactics of blindly going from door to door and convincing people to sign up after knowing that information is ridiculous. Only when I called in to cancel the service was when the customer representative truthfully explained to me that Star Energy Partners would not be a suitable service for me since I live alone and would not utilize as much as 1500 kWh/mo. Even after cancelling it, you have to wait 2-3 months until the service is terminated and removed from your utility bill. There is nothing that can be done to terminate the service immediately or waive the service charge fees during that time as per another customer representative I spoke to at Star Energy. Save yourself the hassle and don't sign up. The other one star reviews posted here are very accurate as well.

A Yin

The door-to-door rep guy did not explain the impact of that customer fee (or advantage fee, whatever) of $0.50 per day, which is $15 per month on average. I would not say this company is dishonest because it is mentioned (in a very small font) in the paper sheet you are told to read on over the phone. Apart from the fact that they cleverly worded that part in English rather than numbers (so in some sense, they hid it), it is mentioned in there. A bigger problem is, they are trying to sell their product to those who cannot benefit from their rate. You need to use at least 1500 kWh/mo to see any potential savings with their rates (In other words, if you are a really big family, this maybe an option). However, their sales rep is soliciting in apartment communities where most will end up paying much more than they should. When being told about their fixed rate (their best selling point), I pointed this out, and the rep just blurred his argument trying his best to deviate my already tired mind of Friday evening from it. I thought it was worth give it a shot if there is no hidden extra fee and he said there is no hidden extra fee -- which was only half-way true because there IS that extra customer fee; technically speaking, it was not hidden but he did not explain it properly. I will cancel this on Monday or as soon as they "put me in their system". Not surprising that these companies solicit during Fridays and make people wait until Monday (and hopefully forget) to do any action. I kick some guys out but this guy was lucky enough to got me. Thanks for piling up another cumbersome task of infinite waiting on the phone to my already busy life. The contract cannot be activated anyway because they sent me an incorrect contract document, which states the first price segment 100 times bigger ($11.29/kWh) than what was promised over the phone (and by the rep), 11.29 cents/kWh and I do have that paper sheet describing the correct price with the rep's handwriting on it.