Utility Companies

Usually, your record with utilities and utility bill payment histories will not appear on credit reports from the three major Consumer Reporting Agencies (CRAs). The three big CRAs are Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. No law requires utility companies to report their accounts with CRAs. However, if you consistently pay on time, utility payments can boost your credit score, especially for individuals with little to no credit history. You can add these payments by engaging a third party to report these payments on your behalf. You can also pay utility bills with a credit card - which gets reported to CRAs regularly - to pay utility bills and then pay off the card regularly. This approach is one way to establish and improve your credit score and credit standing. Payment history can account for 35% of your credit score. Adding good utility payments to your credit report contributes to the number of timely payments.

However, when you don’t pay utility bills, and those bills go to collections, it is likely that this negative history will appear on your credit reports from CRAs, major and minor. Additionally, when you pay utilities and rent together, your utility payment history may appear on some tenant screening and background reports if the landlord reports your payments to those tenant screening and background check companies. Utility bills are especially susceptible to non-payment since people relocate, and utility bills can feel tied to an old residence.

Some companies focus almost exclusively on utility payments. These are usually tenant-screening companies that serve landlords and property management companies, or background check companies that occupy a similar niche. We have compiled a list of all credit reporting agencies for you.

As consumer protection attorneys, we see what can happen when consumers are surprised by the information in their credit reports - whether it’s outdated, inaccurate, duplicative, or from a company you’ve forgotten about. In this article, we provide a list of major utility companies in the US. We can’t provide a complete list of utility companies in the USA because there are too many. How many utility companies are in the USA? There are thousands. So our list contains the largest utility companies in the US and the top utility companies in the U.S. Use this list of the biggest utility companies in the USA to ensure your credit reports do not contain any inaccurate or outdated information from them.

Information on Utility Companies

One of the reasons that utility companies have not been required to report their accounts to CRAs is that utilities have traditionally not been considered credit. Customers pay utility companies for a service rather than making payments on a line of credit. The term utility typically refers to all the essential services we need to live, services like electricity and gas for heating and lighting, water and sewage services for sanitation, and trash and recycling collection for waste management. Utility payments typically meant customers received regular charges for using these services, and since those bills varied based on usage, regional rates, and service providers, they weren’t considered credit.

However, the concept of utilities has evolved. In the modern world, utilities have expanded to include telecommunications services like telephone, internet, WiFi, and cable TV as they have become necessary for contemporary life. Payment of some of these bills resembles something more akin to the sort of credit that would appear on a credit report.

Main Utility and Telecom Companies

Below is a list of the top utility companies in the USA. If you see one on a credit report, tenant screening report, or background check report, contact a background check lawyer at Consumer Attorneys. We will confirm that it is supposed to be there.

Utility Companies

1. Alabama Power Company
2. Ameren Corporation
3. American Electric Power
4. American Water Works Company, Inc.
5. Arizona Public Service
6. Atmos Energy
7. Baltimore Gas and Electric
8. Berkshire Hathaway Energy
9. CenterPoint Energy
10. CMS Energy
11. Consolidated Edison
12. Dominion Energy
13. DTE Energy
14. Duke Energy
15. Entergy Corporation
16. Exelon Corporation
17. FirstEnergy Corp.
18. Florida Power and Light Company
19. Georgia Power
20. Hawaiian Electric Industries
21. Idaho Power
22. Indianapolis Power & Light Company
23. Kansas City Power and Light Company
24. Kentucky Utilities
25. Los Angeles Department of Water and Power
26. MidAmerican Energy Company
27. Mississippi Power
28. National Grid USA
29. New Jersey Natural Gas
30. New York Power Authority
31. NextEra Energy
32. NiSource
33. NorthWestern Energy
34. NV Energy
35. Oklahoma Gas & Electric
36. Pacific Gas and Electric Company
37. PECO Energy Company
38. Portland General Electric
39. PPL Corporation
40. Public Service Electric and Gas Company (PSE&G)
41. Puget Sound Energy
42. Salt River Project
43. San Diego Gas & Electric
44. Sempra Energy
45. Southern California Edison
46. Southern Company
47. Southwestern Electric Power Company
48. Tampa Electric
49. Tennessee Valley Authority
50. The AES Corporation
51. The Illuminating Company
52. Tucson Electric Power
53. TXU Energy
54. Vectren
55. Virginia Natural Gas
56. Westar Energy
57. Xcel Energy

Telecom Companies

1. AT and T Inc.
2. Boost Mobile
3. CenturyLink (now Lumen Technologies)
4. Charter Communications (Spectrum)
5. Comcast Corporation (Xfinity)
6. Cox Communications
7. Cricket Wireless
8. Dish Network
9. Frontier Communications
10. Google Fi
11. HughesNet
12. Metro by T-Mobile
13. Mint Mobile
14. NetZero
15. Nextiva
16. RingCentral
17. Sprint Corporation (now part of T-Mobile US)
18. T-Mobile US
19. TracFone Wireless
20. U.S. Cellular
21. Verizon Communications
22. Visible
23. Vonage
24. Windstream
25. Xfinity Mobile

Tenant Screening Companies

1. Advanced Background Services
2. AmRent
3. AmerUSA
4. AppFolio
5. Contemporary Information Corporation
6. CoreLogic Rental Property Solutions
7. Experian RentBureau
8. InfoLink
9. LeasingDesk by RealPage
10. On-Site by RealPage
11. rTenant by Real ID
12. RentGrow by Yardi Systems
13. Screening Reports
14. StarPoint Screening
15. TransUnion SmartMove
16. Tenant Data Services
17. TurboTenant
18. TransUnion Rental Screening

Contact Us

Credit reporting, tenant screening, and background check reporting can be confusing, especially when you add utility companies to a report. Even the best utility companies in the US don’t always have the best mechanisms and procedures for reporting customers’ accounts to credit reporting and tenant screening companies.

A credit dispute lawyer knows the laws that govern the reporting and sale of a consumer’s history and personal data. If you are confused by the appearance of one of the big utility companies in your credit report and wondering if it should be there; or if information from one of the largest utility companies in the USA is inaccurate and you want to dispute it, contact us.

Call us at 1-877-901-3829. Email us at info@consumerattorneys.com. Visit our website and talk to a representative online or fill out a contact form.

We are happy to talk to you, assess your situation, offer legal advice, and, if necessary, represent you in court. Because even the largest utility companies in the USA need to obey the law. We hold them accountable when they don’t. And sometimes, large utility companies listen to a lawyer more than a customer.