Arizona Public Service’s Saver Choice TOU-E rate has a peak/off-peak gap of over 6x in winter, 23.9¢/kWh on peak versus just 4.1¢/kWh in a specific midday window. Most APS customers who’ve heard “peak is 3 to 8pm” have no idea that window even exists.
APS's cheapest off-peak window only exists part of the year. Look up the exact hours for your plan.
See my peak hours →Saver Choice (TOU-E)
APS sells several Saver Choice variants (some with a demand charge, some without); TOU-E is the simple energy-only version most residential customers should compare first.
| Season | Months | Peak (3–8pm) | Mid-peak | Off-peak |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Winter | Jan–Apr, Nov–Dec | 23.9¢/kWh | 11.7¢/kWh (8pm–10am) | 4.1¢/kWh (10am–3pm) |
| Summer | May–Oct | 25.2¢/kWh | 11.7¢/kWh (8pm–3pm) | n/a, folded into mid-peak |
The 3–8pm peak window doesn’t move by season, only the rate does. What does move is the midday off-peak window: it exists from January through April and again in November and December, but disappears entirely from May through October, when the 10am–3pm hours simply become mid-peak instead. That’s the opposite of what most people would guess, the cheapest window is available in the cooler months, not the hot ones, because those midday hours in summer are exactly when air conditioning demand (and therefore grid cost) is highest.
APS’s older, now-closed “Frozen” tariffs (ET-2, ECT-2, still billed to legacy customers who signed up before they closed to new enrollment) used a completely different 7pm-to-noon peak window structure. If you’ve been on APS for years and your bill mentions a plan name with “ET-2” or “ECT-2,” you’re not on Saver Choice and this schedule doesn’t apply to you directly, though the same shifting principles do.
What Shifting Is Worth, in Dollars
Take a winter afternoon: dishwasher and laundry, about 4 kWh, run inside the 10am–3pm off-peak window instead of the 3–8pm peak.
At peak: 4 kWh × $0.239 = $0.96 Same load in the 10am–3pm winter off-peak window: 4 kWh × $0.041 = $0.16
That’s $0.79 saved per shifted routine, an 83% cut, the largest percentage swing on this list. Over 100 winter weekdays, hitting that midday window consistently is worth roughly $79 for the season. In summer, without the ultra-cheap midday tier, the same shift only reaches the 11.7¢ mid-peak rate: 4 kWh × $0.117 = $0.47, saving $0.53 instead, still meaningful but less dramatic.
The Habit That Actually Pays Off Here
Retirees, remote workers, or anyone home during the day in winter should specifically target the 10am–3pm window for dishwasher and laundry runs, not “sometime off-peak.” That five-hour block is the single cheapest electricity APS sells, and it only exists half the year.
Should You Switch to Saver Choice?
The 3–8pm peak window is wide and covers prime dinner-and-homework hours, so this plan asks a real behavioral commitment from anyone who can’t push activity later than 8pm. The payoff is correspondingly large for households that can, especially anyone who can concentrate winter daytime usage into the 10am–3pm window.
For more ways to cut the bill beyond the rate plan itself, see how to lower your electric bill.
I can run your last 12 months of APS usage against the standard rate and Saver Choice and tell you which one actually costs less for how you live.
Find my best APS plan →For a broader diagnosis of what’s driving a high bill in the first place, see why is my electric bill so high.
Dana Whitmore
Energy Engineer & Billing Analyst · Optiwatt Energy Advisor
Dana has spent the past three years analyzing residential electricity billing data across PG&E, SCE, and SDG&E service territories. She's reviewed billing records for thousands of California households, and built the simulation engine that powers this site's rate-plan comparisons. She holds a degree in Electrical Engineering and lives in the Bay Area.