“Free Power 100” is Direct Energy’s latest heavily-advertised “free weekends” rehash. It’s identical to last summer’s “Free Power Weekends 12” plan, except for a bundled $100 Visa gift card and 0.3-0.4 ¢/kWh higher energy rates. As usual, a high weekday energy rate means that overall it costs upwards of 20% more than many competitors. The table below compares the options for customers in DFW, which is the best case. Houston-area premiums are higher.
| Direct Energy “Free Power 100” (DFW/Oncor area) | |||
| Avg monthly usage (kWh) | |||
| 500 | 1000 | 2000 | |
| Average rate (¢/kWh) 1 | 10.1 | 9.3 | 8.8 |
| 12-month cost (after $100 gift card) | $506 | $1,016 | $2,012 |
| – Lowest-cost fixed-rate competitor 2 | $369 | $755 | $1,670 |
| = Direct Energy cost premium | +$137 | +$261 | +$342 |
| +37% | +35% | +20% | |
As a reminder, Direct Energy’s “average rate” claim already assumes 31% of your usage occurs within the “free” period. So unless your electricity usage is extremely weekend-centric, don’t expect you’ll make up the difference. See the previous review for more on why “free weekends” plans generally aren’t a great deal.
To find your true lowest cost electric plan options, click the link below and enter your monthly usages into our RateGrinder tool. There’s no simpler way to save the most on your electric bill!
1 Data from “Electricity Facts label (EFL) Direct Energy Free Power 100 – Indexed Oncor Electric Delivery Service Area 11/7/2017”
2 Competitor data per RateGrinder analysis on 11/15/2017. See Today’s Best Rates for the latest survey of offerings.