Your electricity company is legitimate if it holds an active PUCT certificate of registration — and you can confirm that in about three minutes without picking up the phone.
Texas deregulation gives residential customers real choice, but it also created space for unlicensed solicitors, short-lived shell providers, and enrollment tactics that blur the line between aggressive sales and outright fraud. This guide walks through the verification steps in order, then covers the warning signs that merit a closer look even when a license checks out.
Why PUCT Licensing Is the Starting Point
The Public Utility Commission of Texas regulates every retail electricity provider (REP) operating in the deregulated Texas market. To legally sell electricity to a residential or small commercial customer, a company must hold a PUCT certificate of registration. That certificate requires the provider to meet financial solvency standards, carry customer protection bonds, and follow the commission’s billing and disclosure rules.
A company without a valid certificate is operating illegally. Any contract you sign with an unlicensed entity is unenforceable under Texas law, and you have no PUCT complaint avenue if something goes wrong. That last point matters because the complaint process is one of the few practical remedies available to customers who get burned.
Licensing is necessary but not sufficient. A licensed provider can still have a poor complaint record, opaque billing, or plans structured to cost more than advertised. Verification is step one. Evaluation is step two.
Step 1: Look Up the PUCT License Directly
Go to the PUCT’s online registration search at puc.texas.gov. Navigate to “Registration” under the “Electric” section and use the REP search tool. You can search by company name or certificate number.
What you are looking for:
Certificate status. It should read “Active.” A status of “Suspended,” “Revoked,” or “Inactive” means the provider cannot legally enroll new customers and may not be able to serve existing ones.
Certificate number. Active REPs have a five-digit certificate number that begins with 10 — for example, REP Certificate No. 10004. If a company cannot provide this number when you ask, that is a material gap.
Company name match. Confirm the name on the certificate matches the name on any contract, website, or door-to-door credential being presented to you. Some solicitors operate under a parent company’s license while representing a brand the commission has not separately reviewed.
If the search returns no results for a company actively trying to enroll you, stop the enrollment process. Contact PUCT’s consumer protection division before proceeding.
Step 2: Cross-Reference the Electricity Facts Label
Every licensed Texas REP is required to provide an Electricity Facts Label (EFL) for each plan it sells. The EFL is a standardized one-page disclosure that shows the plan’s pricing at 500 kWh, 1,000 kWh, and 2,000 kWh monthly usage levels, the contract term, cancellation fee, and renewable content percentage.
If a provider or agent cannot produce an EFL on request, that is a regulatory violation, not just a sales inconvenience. The EFL requirement exists precisely so customers can compare plans on equal terms.
LightCompanies does EFL math in-house across the plans it tracks. Among the 11 plan reviews published as of September 2026, 10 were flagged as high-gimmick, meaning the pricing structure at the 1,000 kWh level looked materially different from the advertised rate once bill credits, base charges, and usage thresholds were calculated through. That does not mean those plans are from unlicensed providers. It means a clean license does not protect you from a plan designed to obscure its true cost. Confirm the EFL exists, then read it.
The math on an EFL is not complicated. Take the total estimated charge at 1,000 kWh and divide by 1,000. That gives you the average cents-per-kWh rate at that usage level. Do the same at 500 kWh and 2,000 kWh. If the per-kWh rate at 500 kWh is dramatically higher than at 1,000 kWh, there is likely a bill credit that only activates above a usage threshold. That structure can be legitimate, but it is a cost risk if your actual usage varies.
Step 3: Check the PUCT Complaint Record
PUCT publishes complaint data by provider. LightCompanies tracks this dataset and normalizes it to complaints per 10,000 estimated customers, which makes comparison across providers of different sizes meaningful. The current dataset on file covers July through December 2025. PUCT only publishes quarterly snapshots, so this represents the most recent complete period available.
A raw complaint count without a customer base denominator is misleading. A large provider with 500,000 customers filing 200 complaints looks worse in absolute terms than a small provider with 8,000 customers filing 30 complaints. Normalized, the large provider files 4 complaints per 10,000 customers; the small provider files 37.5. The latter is the higher-risk signal.
When reviewing the complaint record for any provider:
- Compare normalized rates against peers serving the same usage tier, not the market average in the abstract.
- Look at complaint categories. Billing disputes and enrollment errors are different risk profiles than complaints about disconnection practices.
- Note trends. A provider whose rate doubled in a single quarter warrants scrutiny even if the absolute number is still low.
LightCompanies covers 34 providers under active coverage. Where a provider in this set has a complaint rate that ranks above the median for its tier, that finding is disclosed in the profile. If you are evaluating a provider not in the coverage set, the PUCT data is publicly accessible and the normalization method is straightforward: estimated customer count from available market data divided into the complaint count, multiplied by 10,000.
Step 4: Review Third-Party Ratings With Appropriate Skepticism
BBB accreditation, Google reviews, and Trustpilot scores are secondary signals. They are not substitutes for PUCT verification, but they can surface patterns that regulatory data misses, particularly around customer service responsiveness and billing dispute resolution speed.
LightCompanies last verified third-party ratings for tracked providers on February 25, 2026. A few calibration points worth keeping in mind when reading these scores:
BBB ratings measure responsiveness to complaints filed through BBB’s platform, not overall service quality. A provider with an A+ rating has responded to and resolved BBB complaints. It does not necessarily mean customers are satisfied with the underlying service.
Google and Trustpilot scores are unverified and subject to review manipulation in both directions. A spike in five-star reviews following a promotional campaign is a different signal than a steady accumulation of four-star reviews over two years. Look at review velocity and recency, not just the aggregate score.
For providers LightCompanies actively tracks, these scores are presented alongside PUCT complaint data so neither metric carries disproportionate weight. A provider with a low PUCT complaint rate but a 2.1 Trustpilot score warrants investigation into what types of issues are not making it into the regulatory complaint channel.
Red Flags That Apply Even to Licensed Providers
A valid PUCT certificate eliminates the most serious risk (an unlicensed operator) but does not clear every concern. These patterns are worth flagging regardless of license status.
Verbal-only rate quotes. Any rate discussed verbally that does not match the EFL when you ask for it is a discrepancy worth pressing on before signing.
Pressure to sign immediately. PUCT rules give residential customers three federal business days to rescind a switch without fee or penalty, counted from when you receive the terms of service document — that applies to door-to-door sign-ups and to phone and online enrollments alike. A sales agent who claims the rate expires before you can read the EFL is either wrong or hoping you do not know about that right.
Bundled products at enrollment. Some providers bundle home warranty products, identity monitoring, or smart thermostat subscriptions into enrollment. These are not electricity services. They are separate contracts with separate cancellation terms. Read them separately.
Switching without consent. Slamming, the practice of switching a customer’s provider without authorization, is illegal under PUCT rules. If you receive a welcome letter from a provider you never contacted, call your current provider and PUCT’s consumer protection line immediately. Do not wait for the switch to process.
Plans without a stated contract term. Month-to-month plans are legitimate products. Variable-rate plans are legitimate products. But a plan that does not clearly state whether it is fixed or variable, and for what term, is not fully disclosed under PUCT requirements. Ask before you sign.
What to Do If Something Goes Wrong
If you believe a provider has violated PUCT rules, the filing process is accessible at puc.texas.gov under “File a Complaint.” PUCT’s consumer protection division logs and tracks complaints, and that data eventually becomes part of the normalized record that analysts and aggregators like LightCompanies use in ongoing coverage.
For disputes that do not rise to a PUCT complaint, the BBB filing process creates a documented response trail. For potential fraud involving unlicensed operators, the Texas Attorney General’s consumer protection division is the appropriate referral.
Documentation discipline matters here. Keep copies of every EFL, contract, and welcome letter. Screenshot any online rate quote before you proceed through enrollment. If a dispute arises, the EFL you signed against is the anchor document.
The Verification Sequence in Summary
To confirm a Texas electricity provider is operating legitimately, the sequence is: PUCT license search first, EFL review second, complaint record third, third-party ratings fourth. Each step filters a different category of risk. None of them replaces the others.
Licensing confirms legal standing. The EFL confirms the plan’s true cost structure. The complaint record surfaces operational patterns that pre-enrollment research cannot detect. Third-party ratings add texture on customer experience that the regulatory record may underweight.
Running all four steps takes under 20 minutes for any provider. That is a reasonable investment before committing to a 12 or 24-month electricity contract. The deregulated Texas market offers genuine options. Knowing how to distinguish a clean operator from a problematic one is how you use that choice to your advantage.