Frequently Asked Questions About Utility Bill Audits
1. Should we have an audit, doesn’t everyone pay the same rate?
No, not everyone pays the same rate. Rate structures are complex and change frequently. Rates differ by state, for each utility type, and for different industry categories.
It is up to your organization to find any errors, request your exemptions, file all the correct paperwork, and follow up to get your refunds or savings. Or we can do this for you.
2. How much does it cost to have an audit?
Our utility bill audit costs you nothing upfront. If you receive a refund, your utility company will send it directly to you, and then you will share it with us according to our Agreement. If there is no refund, then you owe us nothing. So you never have an out-of-pocket expense for our audit.
3. Do you need copies of all of our bills going back 3 years?
No, you only need to give us one recent bill for each of the utility and telecom services that we will audit. When you sign the one-page Authorization Form, this gives us permission with the utility and telecom service providers to review your past bills.
4. This seems too good to be true, is this legitimate?
What we do is audit bills, that’s all. And we do the audit in our office. These audits are based on federal and state programs, some dating back to the 1930’s which give certain categories of organizations exemptions on their utility and telecom bills. We will never ask you for money upfront, and in fact never touch your money. We only get paid for our audit when you send us our share after you have received your refund. We have testimonial letters from clients who like you, wondered if there was a catch, but were delighted with the outcome of our audit.
5. We’re very busy, will this take up a lot of our time?
No, we make our audit as easy as possible for our clients. All we need is for you to give us one recent bill for each service and sign one-page Authorization and Agreement forms. We do our audit of your bills at our office and will not be at your site disrupting your operations.
6. Is it worth it for us to do this? How often do you recover $?
We find errors and are able to recover overcharges for over 70% of the bills we audit. This means that 30% of the organizations we audit have ‘clean’ bills with no overcharges. Even if you don’t recover $, you’ve received a free audit to assure you that you have not been leaving any money behind. Your financial staff will appreciate receiving another level of financial due diligence.
7. Will you review our utility bills even if they are not very large?
We will audit any size organization that is eligible from a small nonprofit to a Fortune 500 company with operations in multiple states. We recovered overcharges for an organization with only a telephone bill in its name.
8. What services do you audit?
Depending on the state and the industry type we will audit any of these services that you use: electricity, gas, propane, water, sewer, waste disposal, land line phone, cell phone, Internet, and cable.
9. What organizations are eligible for an audit?
Which organizations are eligible will differ by state, but include some combination of manufacturing companies, agricultural enterprises, governmental facilities, and nonprofit organizations.
10. What kind of errors are identified during an audit?
We audit your bills using proprietary software as well as a review by our experienced audit team and can identify incorrect meter readings, rate structures, taxes, fees, and surcharges, unusual usage patterns, duplicate billings, maintenance as well as other issues.
11. We already review our bills regularly, isn’t that enough?
Unless you have a staff member trained as a utility / telecom auditor, you will miss many of the errors that our auditors can identify. It’s great for you to review your bills to see if something is obviously incorrect, but can you identify recent changes in tariffs?
Do you know the latest incentives that your service provider has put in place? Do you want to spend time researching what paperwork you need to complete and send to the utility company? Do you want to followup with the utility company when you don’t receive an expected bill adjustment? Our clients who thought they were reviewing their bills regularly, have been excited when we were able to get them sizable refunds.
12. Should we have another audit if we’ve already had one?
We can help you determine if it makes sense for you to have another audit, usually it’s a good idea. Our audit will cost you nothing upfront, the programs and exemptions change frequently, and audit companies may focus on identifying different errors. Recently I spoke with the facilities manager of a hospital who was in the process of getting his second audit in 2 years. He acknowledged how valuable it was to have a 3rd party independent review of his utility bills.
Now I have 3 questions for you.
1. Why not let us audit your bills and recover $ for you so that you can focus on running your business?
2. What would you do with the extra $ that your organization receives?
3. Why would you leave your $ sitting on the utility company’s books?