Feel your pain
I feel your pain, I mean, I really feel your pain. My daytime job is reading gas and electric meters for our local utilities.
The pain comes from people trapping me to complain about their bill or them thinking I control whether it gets shut off or not. The stories of cheating that people do you would not believe.
Three things that you should do:
1. They can be read wrong. Compare your usage to previous bills, if they are too much different say a 1000 kw, ask them to come back out to read it again.
2. If you have high usage ask about a Demand Meter that gives a lower rate after a certain amount is attained.
3. Make sure the person who reads your meter can actually get to it.
If they can't read it because of a fence, locked door, Bad Ass Dog, bushes or any other reason, the utility will estimate it. Because of the high usage this summer it will probably be high.
When they shut down coal and deny nuclear and we're buying natural gas from Mexico, what do you think will happen to the cost?