Richmond resident Moseley Jack feels he was duped by a natural gas marketer who signed him to a five-year contract in 2008.
If the 76-year-old had stayed with Fortis BC (then Terasen) he would have saved thousands of dollars on his gas costs.
The only silver lining for the retiree is his contract with Summitt Energy ends this October.
He's already confirmed with Fortis that when the fixed contract, ends he will automatically return to the provincial utility, whose current rate of $4 per gigajoule is less than half the $10.49 per gigajoule he's been paying since October 2008.
Jack was spurred to tell his story after the Vancuover Sun published an article Wednesday saying large numbers of residential consumers are dropping out of fixedrate natural gas contracts. The number of residential customers who had fixed contracts with marketers dropped to 54,948 in 2012 from 101,459 in 2011, largely because customers who had signed five-year contracts did not renew, according to an annual review of the so-called customer choice program introduced in 2007.
"I'm surprised the government would not have shut it down," said Jack, noting his story is also a warning to other natural gas consumers.
For the full story, visit www.vancouversun.com.
