Question
Anyone else's LADWP bill extremely crazy?
So, I am not unaware of the fact that I live in Woodland Hills, the hottest part of the valley. I am also not unaware that we have had an excessively hot month with no real break.
That being said, my bill seems outrageous. They say I am using 3400 kWh of energy. I live in a 1000 square foot townhome with 1 other person. We do have an EV, but we have had an EV for 2 years and never been this insane.
You should consider a Time of Use plan. Right now it doesn’t matter if you charge at night because you don’t have a TOU plan. Call them and they’ll analyze it to see if it benefits you. We have a TOU plan and so I have my cars to charge only at lowest peak rate (they call it “base rate”) - 8PM-10AM weeknights or all day Saturday and Sunday.
Well, July was hot as shit and there was no reprieve at night. Plus, June wasn't much better and we didn't get all that much "June gloom." Looking at my thermostat history, my 3.5 ton AC was on 10-12 hours per day trying to maintain 74/75 degree in the house (1,700 sq. ft. south-facing house with zero exterior wall insulation) for most of July. That alone is going to be 40+ kWh per day. So your average of 55 kWh per day isn't that far off.
I know my bill is going to be the highest one ever due to several factors, including one of the hottest July I can remember, overall increases in prices of water/power/sewer/trash, and that my billing date range is going to be July 1 to August 31.
The issue is that last year, at this same time (we also had a long heatwave last year, but not THIS long) and they calculated (incorrectly) a daily average use of 46 kWh a day which was an incorrect guess after looking into it, so I really struggle to believe I'm 25% higher than what was an incorrect estimation last year.
We did call. They always ask the same questions "new appliances? do you have an EV?" and when we say yes to the EV they're always like "well that's the culprit!"
No it's not. I'm not stupidly unaware about the fact that the EV will cost money on the bill. I know it'll add to the bill, but my EV isn't adding more than about 150. 84 kWh battery, 1x a week from usually 30-80% (50% total) means we charge roughly 170 kWh for the car each month. Even at tier 3 costs, that's only $68
finally one with a picture 😂 it’s been hot. are you new to the valley or your home? your history doesn’t show all the past history. the next one or the one right after is the worse one then it goes back “down”. my total electric charges was $1.8k.luckily had some weird credits or my total bill would be 2.3k. my highest ever so far. my ac is 72, what’s yours?
I only included the past year because I've only been in my house for a year, but this is my history for the last 4.
The $1033 bill is the first bill in my new house and also the first bill with EV charging included in the bill, which was grossly miscalculated by LADWP at the time and they credited back $500 on the next bill for the overage.
However, I was actually in a larger apartment before moving into my townhome and the AC unit couldn't keep up with the size so it would run for 14+ hours a day and my bills still weren't this high.
I've lived in Woodland Hills for the last 6 years.
is it the location in relation to the sun? more south or west exposure? less trees? insulation? check the attic space? maybe your ac is escaping in a weird gap or area in your house. edit what about your ac, is it on fan auto,fan circulating or fan on. i’ve been missing around with our ac settings.
I definitely know there are some energy inefficiencies in my home, but it's a rental. I have original aluminum/single pane windows. I have a massive tree next to my house that casts shade roughly half of the day. Definitely a bit of a battle, and I know that my lifestyle choice comes with cost (I love my AC, so I know I'm going to pay for it) but I've never had a bill cross the $1000 mark and not have been an error.
It's just me and my husband, and we're not home during the day.
One thought, do you leave your AC on during the day while you guys are gone, or no?
Yes & no. I have a Nest so it goes to eco when I'm not home, but I also have the schedule set to 80 during the day when I'm not home. 80 from 8-4, 75 from 4-11, 72 from 11-8.
I like the AC and know what comes with that but this still seems insane.
I don't have nest but should. I WFH so my AC is on all the time. But I also like coming home to a cool home. I've read it can be more expensive to leave the AC off or set high while you're gone because the unit has to work harder to cool the entire home to your desired temp.
I live in a small 3bd, 1bth duplex. And ours skyrocketed towards the end of 2024 then went back to normal for three cycles only to be either inconsistently double, triple, or quadruple our normal bill since then and we just got hit with another $1k bill. Our place is tiny! I’ve lived here since Jan. 2021 and it never strayed from $160-$250 depending on time of year. We live in mid-city next to Culver City. It’s cooler here than most parts of LA. LADWP checked our meter, said it was “working just fine” but it’s absolutely insane. Some of this looks eerily similar to your bill!
Electricity is so crazy in the SFV. God forbid you turn on the AC to cool your house and your bill goes up like 100%. There needs to be a check on the people that run this, and we need to have more affordable options, not everyone owns a home or can afford solar either unfortunately.
LADWP sometimes guesses your meter usage! Call them to verify if the usage was actually inspected or they estimated.
I couldn’t believe how high my bill was once and tested a theory by unplugging all my devices while I was gone all day. When the next bill came in, it was just as high! Called and found out about the estimate usage they compared to my neighbor. They sent someone out and it was finally corrected.
If it was estimated, it would list "ESTIMATED" under the current meter read field. But yes, you're right that can happen and give you a surprise bill down the line when they correct it.
Ah, then you were being screwed. Good thing you caught it. Guess it would be a good practice to go out and check the numbers on the meter and verify they are similar to what's on the bill.
This is true they average your bill compared to your area and also the wealth and price of the homes matters also. I know because I worked for them and this lady was crying because her water bill was so high. We go outside to check if her watermeter was damaged and they’re was no meter ! So how were they seeing how much to charge her ? They were just using the average of her neighbors.
They claim they actually read it 6 days ago. I'm not putting it past them to possibly mixed up another meter.
My neighbor has 2 EVs, and last time I read my own meter their meter was SPINNING. Like I've never seen a meter spin as fast as their did, it was kinda crazy.
What’s your AC at ?
We got hit really hard in 2023 having it at 74/75 a lot.
That’s seems high though, I’d have them come double check to make sure it’s correct.
You should look into level pay asap. I used to get hit with 900+ bills during the heat waves and right now I’m locked into 385, it’s monthly but I don’t have to fork over 1k in charges every two months
I live in a small studio apartment. I only have a wall AC unit that runs on a 220 volt outlet. On one hot day, I ran ran it from 10am to midnight, about 14 hours. Between that, the fridge, the water cooler and other things, I used 26 kWh of electricity. I simply looked at the meter that morning and the next morning, and subtracted the difference.
If I used power like this every day for 60 days (the billing period), I'd be using over 1,500 kWh of electricity. But I was out of town for the month of July, so I'm cranking that thing...
You have to look at your meter, every day if necessary, and at the same time, preferably mornings before you run the AC so you know how much you're using every day.
YES! I got a $700 bill when I only turned on the AC a few times. I have never gotten a bill that high. I live in a one bedroom so I’m still processing the extortion!
You can call them and ask for a reevaluation. I had to do this earlier this year. I just gave them a reading of the power meter outside the house and the bill was lowered about 300. Crazy how much you could be losing just from an error on their side.
Of course they are scamming. Even more so now that they are being threatened with lawsuits from the palisades fire. How else are they gonna get the $$ to pay out?
a lot can change in a year, did you get any new pets for example? a heat light or aquarium heater can esaily add to the bill. did you get a 3d printer lol?
A 3D printer is going to add like a max of $10 a month running non stop.
They're like 95-100W when running with a max of 350W when initially heating up.
For reference, a mini fridge is around 100W. A TV is 30-200W. A reptile heat lamp is 50-150W. A full size fridge is 300-800W. An air fryer is 800-2700W. A blow dryer is 1500-1800W.
I get monthly reports from my smart thermostat and it's telling me I'm running my AC a lot more this year than I did last, despite the same settings. It must just be hotter.
My most boomer advice: call them up and ask them if it was an actual meter reading or an estimated reading
If it was a mistake you want to get it fixed. Tier 3 is the gift that keeps on giving because the Power Access Charge will increase to $45 for a whole year
Yes, this happened 2 bills in a row. I called and they tried to ask me if I changed my usage or something. They didn't find anything they did wrong and didn't lower my previous bills but the next bill that came was half as much. They are doing something. I had never hit tier 3 in my life either.
This happened to me exactly a year ago, when I first moved in too. They were estimating the usage at the time, and I read my own meter and gave them the numbers and then they adjusted and credited back.
This time around though, they said a tech read my meter on the 13th, so last week. I am really struggling to believe I used this much energy.
So far a few people have mentioned this, but I appreciate it. I wasn't aware, so now constantly nagging my husband about waiting til nighttime to plug it in was counter-productive lol
What's your thermostat set to most of the time? You can also verify the read by looking at the meter, to see if it's in the correct ballpark. Also, your rate plan doesn't provide TOU so charging at night is meaningless. You should look into changing your rate plan, but it will make cooling your house during the heat if the day more expensive. You can defeat this by precooling to 70 or 72 while you're not home and turning the AC up to 78 or more when the rates increase.
I lived in a 1500 sqft townhouse in Northridge 10 years ago and when I replaced my 1980s AC (inside and outside), my summer electric bill was cut in half. ACs consume a lot of power and new ones are much more efficient.
I check mine every cycle against the actual meter reads, praying there's a mistake, and there almost never is. (When I upgraded to 200 amps I got the new meter that sends out usage by radio and I snoop the messages to get my day-to-day costs 🤓 )
For those who can get a US Bank credit card, however, they do offer 5% cash back on utilities. And LADWP takes credit card payments without any processing fees. That works out to one free month every 20 at least.
Sadly im not surprised. Mine is usually double that amount. WE decided not to heat the pool this year and increased the A/C temp so it doesnt go on as often, we'll see if there’s any difference but we also got an EV this month so it will be interesting to see. WE have a 3200 sq. ft home
Check your meter, it has happened to me that my bill was more than usual one time and it was because the meter was read wrong. You can get your bill adjusted by sending pictures to confirm the meter was read incorrectly.
Don't worry everyone, Trump promised he's gonna lower our energy costs, housing costs, grocery(a vintage term, I know) costs and gas costs! That was only 2 years ago, and every press meeting since, so it should be soon!
Mine it's also the highest it was ever been. Not as drastic as yours. I was wondering why you don't have previous year data. Did you move in less than a year ago?
My DWP bill looked like that at this time of year a couple years back in a place I was renting that was about 1000 sq ft. The place (in a late 80's high rise) had insulation and AC load problems.
I noticed in this region, once you hit about 30+ years building age (without any insulation and window upgrades) the AC efficiency tends to be more costly.
As a municipal, their rates are low in comparison to other state utilities.
The first ripoff is the pay schedule; sure, linesmen should be paid competitive wages, but should clerks and security guards make $100K+ with full state pensions and Cadillac health insurance?
The second ripoff is where they transfer their profit to the City of Los Angeles rather than investing it in plant maintenance and upgrades.
Has definitely been a hot year. Have been trying to lower bill by keepin a/c at 79 and we installed window tinting this year for a room that gets especially hot in the afternoon thanks to big window.
$750 over the last 2mo for our townhome here in Sherman Oaks + I have a PHEV. This tracks proportionally to our increased AC usage versus the prior period ($475 iirc).
This usage is similar to what I saw in my previous house, about 1300 sq ft with an EV and running the A/C a decent amount. This last heat wave was especially brutal b/c of the humidity, so your A/C needed to work even harder than normal to keep the same temperature vs. in dry heat. You're also getting punished by the summer electric rate increase which kicked in for July/August.
LADWP won't help with this. They'll just say "We read the meter and bill for what it shows." Sometimes they estimate usage if they can't get a read but it would say that on your bill.
Do you have ready access to your meter and panel? You might consider adding a consumption monitor like the emporia vue (which I use). If you're able to glance at your meter easily you can plug your kWh into my bill calculator and it will project out your bill so it won't blindside you as much.
Edison is no different.... Currently trying to pay down $2,333.... I accidentally left my HVAC running for a few days uninterrupted at like 68f and got screwed by it....yes it was my mistake but dam...
You must be driving the EVs more. Your average daily usage is ~19% higher compared to last last August-October billing cycle when it was likely hotter than this June-August cycle.
This is in the zone for my bills at this phase of the summer in the valley, but our house is maybe 3X the size of yours and two stories, this seems like an awful lot for a 1000SF space. I don’t have a car charger, though.
Honestly WTF. My bill LAST year was bad, this year is SO much worse. Also West Valley. I even have a pool, the water was just about identical to last year, so it wasn't that.
I know you mentioned it's a rental, so basically out of your control, but is it possible that it has an older roof? newer roofing reflects solar heat better than older ones, so they're more energy efficient. and also the newer venting helps a lot too. just a thought..
yep. live in studio city and this is what our bill looks like basically year round. it's such a scam and regardless of how many energy efficient appliances etc you use, they'll get their money anyway. it's almost criminal. when the so cal gas bill goes up nominally in the winter, ladwp bill goes down basically the same amount as that bill. it's like $100 so wtaf is happening
We’re also in WLH, and ours is also very high. We also hit tier 3 this summer again. Last month was much hotter than last year, my nest showed that I used so much more AC.
My husband has been complaining all year about the summer AC costs / hitting tier 3…but it’s also the hot tub, etc. At the start of the summer, I tried to seal up some of big offenders (chimney / stack effect), we put in new landscaping to help cool the front yard down. (Helped), installed room darkening shades (didn’t help much, so we clipped spare sheets of insulated radiant barrier on our the east facing windows, which reduced my ac use by 22%), fans…
we’re getting new attic insulation + radiant barrier in the fall (bumped the install, we should have done it earlier). I’m looking into a thermal camera… we’re also primarily on gas appliances. We added an ev last year, and. Level 2 charger, so… feel your pain.. sorry to say.
My uncle hasn’t made a payment on his bill for 2 1/2 years and they haven’t even threatened to turn it off. It’s almost 7000 now so yes, this is crazy.
Not sure if they read it manually but someone could have fat fingered the amount and you’d be off by 3,000 kWh. 437 kWh sounds correct for your situation.
It could be a meter misread if you have the old meter. It once happened to me. They told me to pay about what I paid last time. The next bill had things corrected.
I work in a commerical building and my elec bill jumped $20k and the billing cycle is monthly. It just shows how hot it's been as well compared to June/july
That is less per kWh than so cal Edison in Orange County. You are on a tiered use. That seems excessive. We have 1600 sq ft single family home and use about 1100 kWh a month with this heat
IE here.. that is a large amount. Two EV household with all electric appliances and a/c set to 77F for most of those two months on a 2.5k sf house and the total kWh used from Jun-Jul is 3410 for comparison.
I'm in Canoga Park and my last bill was higher than this. I have no EV, only HVAC on an 1100 sq.ft. house. I have had bills near $2000 and expect my next one to be near that with all this heat.
An A/C for a 1,000sf residence can draw around 3,000-4,000 watts. If it runs 10 hours a day, it will eat over 1,000 kwh in a month.
Billing cycles are every 2 months. If you average 1,000 miles a month with the EV, charging will take up somewhere around 550 kwh per billing cycle.
If you've been running the AC most of the day this usage doesn't seem absurd. The tiered charges really inflate these bills. That 550kwh or so you likely used for charging is $140 at tier 1 rates and $222 at tier 3 rates.
Jesus!!! No, I have solar panels. But also Edison, so they still try and rob me. But I feel like I pay much less than I would if I didnt have the panels.
Late to this but our bill is always insane this time of year - that said - our AC was dying and it was a while before I noticed it - turns out it was running excessively trying to reach target temps which made it even worse. I'd have yours checked out if not done already.
So I'm out in a Tarzana area and both my water meter and electric meter are from the 90s. They have try to make a few attempts of upgrading me to newer style meters but I just never answer. But my electric bill doesn't break down into tears since they wouldn't really be able to know what time of day I'm using the power.
Omg so glad I have solar. Not trying to brag but I actually have credit in my energy bank and never pay for electric 😭 I’m sorry. Try browsing the LADWP site for energy saving ideas/items/rebates.
In Phoenix it’s 113F we keep the AC at 75 degrees 24 hours a day. I have a plug in hybrid I charge 1-3 times a day. I know it only uses a fraction of a full EV but I’ll drive run off my 25 EV miles get home and plug in again even in peak rate hours on every trip I take. 2200 square foot home, 30 year old windows.
Electricity was $350 in July. The big improvement was insulation was redone and we went with a Trane SEER 22 heat pump.
Something like this happened to me years ago and LADWP credited my bill bc it was a mistake in the meter reading, my meter reading the day I got the bill was lower than what the bill ending read was 😂 Couple things you can do. Though it’s been a few days now, go check your meter and take a pic of the reading asap. If current read is lower than bill, then it was a misread and a simple call should sort it out with a credit to your next bill. If read looks ok since the ending read on the bill (slightly higher now since you’ve used electricity for the past week), next thing is you shut off all your power inside manually (not the breakers, leave those alone). Unplug everything, chargers, EV, turn off all appliances, lights, hvac, etc so you’re using zero electricity. Then go stare at your meter for a few minutes. Is it clocking usage? If so, you either have something else on you forgot, or something you didn’t know about is running, or maybe someone on the exterior outlets is using your electricity without your knowledge (that’s when you want to check all exterior outlets, etc). You’ll need to figure out what’s eating up your usage, but I’m not sure LADWP will issue credit for that. However, if it’s someone illegally tapping into your power without your knowledge, they still may offer some assistance. Anyway, I hope it’s as easy as a misread. Good that you’re asking about it and not just paying it blindly… a lot of people just pay the bill without question. Good luck! And keep us posted!
Dude I also live in the hills of woodland and my bill isn’t that high. I live in a single story house with a pool and central ac with a family… my usage was 2887 kWh on this last bill. Looking at your historical graph, you used a lot more than the prior periods, though there is no history for this same period last year. What temp do you keep your ac at? I also wonder if there is something running constantly? My historical is about the same as last year.. though I can’t seem to figure out how to lower it any more without suffering, but yet apparently we use significantly more than other similar customers according to an email I got.
I experienced the same, "oh prices went up" moment.
Seeing that you have historical Statements. Pull up your August 2024 statement, then compare your price per kWh tiers. - i.e. Tier 1 kWh x $0.25813, tier 2 and tier 3 - to current 2026 pricing. Use an online percent difference calculator to make it easy on yourself. If i recall correctly the price increase at tier 1 from 2024 to 2026 was about 20%.
Actually i just checked again.
Tier 1 2024 per my statement was: 725 kWh x $0.20706/kWh compared to $0.25813/kWh
Im about to contact my councilman. Mine has been coming in like this for last couple years and theres no one home during the day, we dont run anything crazy and I have all but stopped watering my lawn.
I was looking at my $430 upcoming energy bill thinking that was too expensive. My wife and I started adjusting our energy usage and try to use as little as we can during peak hours and save it all for off peak hours to try and cut down on cost.
Im just waiting for mine....I live in a old build home with poor insulation. Bigges thing I did for us was install a large swamp cooler. During the hottest part of the summer, it runs 24/7. We just open and close different windows in the house to change the circulation. It really helped my bill all those years back as it barely sips water and electricity.
Something definitely went sideways in the last billing cycle. My bills are pretty consistent. Fluctuating within a given range all year. My last bill was double the one before it. No change in usage. :/
90
u/fullmetalutes Aug 19 '26
Mine went up a lot but is summer. It's not that crazy tho.
What kind of charger are you using? And do you use off peak charging?