Electricity deregulation. Am weighing switching to an at cost coop, why or why not?

[UTUSN]

Deregulation was stuffed down our throats here several years ago. The Ma Bell type electric company still owns all the infrastructure. I stuck with it because the choices were too much hassle and not-known quantities. Many fly-by-nights have crashed and burned leaving consumers up the creek.

In previous years the highest monthly bills have been in the dead of winter (1-2 months) and the Hades of summer (3-4 months), and the highest have stayed the same, and only for a couple of months. I kept swearing each year that if they ever went higher than that, I would switch.

Well, just got last month's bill, not even at the peak of summer, and it was 42% higher than the previous high for all years. True, it was for a 32-days' cycle instead of the sometimes 29, and some weatherstripping had been done and I purposely ran the cooling longer to see if it made any difference (O.K., THAT doesn't make sense). The bill says the average daily rate is the same as previous months.

I've looked at the state's public utilities website. The big name companies (Reliant) have the same low number of comlaints as the one at cost farmers' coop, and the coop's rate is about the same. Also irrationally, I justify choosing the coop by thinking I'd rather they get the money instead of behemoth fat cats.

It's the same as it's always been since the hippies: Natural/organic choices are much more expensive.

Educate me about coops. And about choices, there are 40 companies. It's like being between doctors after having been with the same one for ten years: You have to go through actual treatments with each one like interviews/try-outs/test-drives before choosing. This ain't that feasible with electric companies.

What helped most with ditching Ma Bell was hearing a woman at work just say that such and such phone company was clearly the cheapest. Hearing it from somebody you trust makes a difference.