Duquesne Light rates: what you pay, and when to switch

Your price to compare is what Duquesne charges for the power itself if you do not pick a supplier. It is counted per kilowatt-hour (kWh), the unit on your bill. It is the number a supplier has to beat.

It has two parts. Supply is the power. Transmission is the cost to carry it over the big power lines. Duquesne adds the two, as its rates page says.

Duquesne has already filed the new supply charge for December 1. It is 0.415¢ higher, so the price to compare rises about 0.42¢. At 600 kWh a month, the average Duquesne home, that is about $2.50 more a month. The state posts the final prices in late November, as it did on November 24, 2025 and November 25, 2024.

1. Oct 1, 2026Duquesne files its new supply charge for December 1: 11.3718¢, up from 10.9568¢.
2. Late NovemberThe state posts the final prices to compare for every utility.
3. Dec 1, 2026The new price starts. Duquesne's estimate is 14.56¢.
4. Jan 1, 2027Duquesne resets its quarterly line-upgrade charge (DSIC) again.
5. Jun 1, 2027The next regular six-month price change.

On June 1, 2026, the PUC's list showed Duquesne with the highest price to compare of Pennsylvania's 11 electric utilities.

Type the offer's price. Say if it is fixed, and add any monthly fee. The tool shows the yearly difference at today's price and from December 1, then says switch, stay or close call using the rule right below it.

This is an estimate of the supply price only. It is not a bill. Delivery charges stay the same with Duquesne or any supplier, taxes are not added, and the tool cannot know what an offer's price becomes when its term ends.

Switch only if the offer passes all four checks. If it fails even one, stay on Duquesne's price and look again at the next price change.

1. 1
   The price is fixed for 12 months or more.

   A variable price can change every month, so a saving today can be gone next month.

2. 2
   You save at least $5 a month ($60 a year) after fees.

   Add the monthly fee to the offer's price first. The tool does that math. Five dollars is about 0.8¢ per kWh at 600 kWh a month, and 0.5¢ at 1,000 kWh.

3. 3
   There is no fee for leaving early.

   If there is one, you need to know the dollar amount before you sign.

4. 4
   You know the end date and what comes after it.

   Put a reminder on your phone for 60 days before the end.

Why $60? Small savings are easy to lose. At 1,000 kWh a month, three months at a price only 2¢ above Duquesne's would cost you $60, the whole saving.

Stay on Duquesne's price when no fixed offer clears the $60 line, when you already have a fixed price that is still under Duquesne's, or when you cannot find the fees and the end date in plain words. Duquesne's price has no contract, and going back to it costs nothing. Look again on June 1 and December 1.

PA Power Switch is the state's own offer list. On October 20, 2026 it listed 132 offers priced per kWh for Duquesne homes. 42 of them (32%) cost less than Duquesne's price. The rest cost the same or more.

The lowest fixed price with no fees is from Powervine Energy. We do not rate that offer here. Read its terms against the four checks first, because offers change often.

On October 20, 2026, the middle fixed offer cost more than Duquesne's own price. Most of the savings sat in a small number of cheap fixed offers. Some offers under Duquesne's price add a monthly fee or a price that can change every month, so they fail checks 1 or 2.

A Duquesne bill has two halves. Delivery is the poles, wires, meter and billing. It is the same no matter who supplies your power. Supply and transmission is the power itself and its trip over the big lines. That half is the price to compare, and it is the half a supplier replaces.

At 600 kWh a month, the same charges come to about $160.40: $75.56 for delivery and $84.84 for supply and transmission. Names on your bill can differ a little from the ones here.

• Customer charge. A flat monthly charge for the meter, reading it, billing you and the service line. You pay it even in a month you use little power. Duquesne's rates page describes it that way.
• Distribution charge. Pays to move power over Duquesne's local poles and wires. The $13.00 and 8.2479¢ are from Duquesne's last rate case and have been in effect since December 20, 2024.
• Universal service charge. Pays for programs that help customers with low incomes, such as the Customer Assistance Program. Every customer pays it.
• Energy-saving programs (EE&C). Pays for the energy-saving programs that state law requires. A new five-year phase began June 1, 2026 at 0.17¢ per kWh.
• Line-upgrade charge (DSIC). Pays for repairing and replacing poles, wires and other equipment between rate cases. It is a percent of the four lines above, not of supply or transmission.
• Supply and transmission. Your price to compare. This is the only half you can shop.
• State tax adjustment. A tiny credit or charge, a few cents, that passes on changes in some state taxes. We left it out of the worked bill.

The line-upgrade charge climbed from 1.39% to 2.17% on July 1 and to 3.36% on October 1, 2026, and it resets every quarter. State law caps it at 5% of the amount billed under distribution rates. You pay it even if you switch suppliers, because it is part of delivery. Duquesne's last rate case ended on November 7, 2024, with a net increase of $53 million. As of October 16, 2026, we found no new Duquesne rate case.

Duquesne buys power for its default customers through bids from wholesale suppliers and passes the cost to you. It sets a new price every six months. The PUC says natural gas prices and higher capacity costs, which are payments that keep power available at peak times, have pushed generation prices up.

In 30 months the price went from 10.46¢ to 14.14¢, up about 35%. For a home that uses 600 kWh a month, that is about $22 more a month. Customers who already have a supplier contract keep paying the price in their contract until it ends.

Switching does not change who delivers your power. Duquesne still owns the wires, reads your meter and fixes outages. If the lights go out, call Duquesne, not your supplier.

1. Pick an offerUse the PA Power Switch list or our tool. Ask for the written terms before you agree.
2. Sign up with the supplierYou do this with the supplier, not with Duquesne. Keep a copy of the terms.
3. You have 3 business days to cancelThe clock starts when you get the written terms, and a supplier cannot ask you to give it up (52 Pa. Code § 54.5).
4. Duquesne makes the changeThe state's rule gives Duquesne 3 business days after it gets the supplier's sign-up order (52 Pa. Code § 57.174). Ask the supplier for your start date.
5. Watch for two notices at the endYou will recieve one notice 45 to 60 days before a fixed term ends and another at least 30 days before (52 Pa. Code § 54.10).

If you want out early, switching back to Duquesne's price costs nothing, but your supplier may charge a fee for leaving a fixed contract early. PA Power Switch says early cancellation fees do not apply in the last 30 days of a contract.

Call Duquesne at (888) 393-7600 (the number on the PUC's help list) if a charge looks wrong or you cannot pay. Ask about the Customer Assistance Program, budget billing and payment plans.

If a supplier changed your price from what you were told, or signed you up without your OK, file a complaint with the PUC at 1-800-692-7380. The Office of Consumer Advocate also takes calls at (800) 684-6560. Both numbers are in the state's rules for supplier disclosure statements.

For a long list of programs and hardship funds, see help paying your electric bill. To learn why a bill jumped, read why your electric bill is so high.