Get to Know Your Household Electric Habits

The first step to taking control of your electric bill is getting to know where your electricity is used. Think of it like your household financial budget.

Most of us wouldn’t deposit our paycheck and then spend freely without knowing where the money went. Those serious about budgeting—or simply making ends meet—track their spending to see where every dollar goes.

If you apply the same approach to your household energy use, you can budget your usage and gain better control over your monthly electric bill.

As individuals or as a co-op, we can’t control the price of electricity, but we can reduce unnecessary usage or adjust our habits to use more power during lower-cost hours. These shifts can significantly reduce your electric bill.

URECC provides a powerful tool for members to monitor their power usage hour by hour: the URECC SmartHub app.

The “Actual Usage” page on the app (shown left) displays a graph of your daily usage, making it easy to spot peak hours and adjust usage accordingly.

By applying what you’ve learned from the “Beat the Peak” section above, you can shift certain activities—like running the dishwasher or using the washer and dryer—to off-peak hours when electricity costs less.

With SmartHub, members can identify high-usage hours and make daily adjustments to appliance usage, charging habits, or thermostat settings—cooling the home before and after peak hours.

Another helpful feature of the SmartHub app is the ability to set alerts when your usage exceeds a certain threshold. After reviewing your daily usage, you can set a limit alert to notify you if you go over your usual or budgeted amount.

When that limit is reached, the SmartHub app sends you a notification. If usage seems unusually high, you can look for a cause: Did the weather spike? Was the A/C running harder? Were power tools used? Did the pool pump run longer than usual?

Knowing when and where you’re using power helps you build energy-smart habits and may even encourage you to set a monthly energy budget. Both can help reduce your electric bill over time.

Weather has a big impact on your electricity usage. Learn how temperature swings affect your energy bill and how SmartHub can help you adapt.