Gimmick Watch · Case file № 1 · Free days + mail offer
Free Pass 12 Reviewed TXU Energy "Free Pass 12": the $50 check that isn't a check, and the free days you pay for in advance.
This mailer is landing in Dallas–Fort Worth mailboxes right now. We read every footnote on the back so you don't have to. Short version: the one number that decides whether this plan is any good appears nowhere on it.
The mailer
What arrived in the mail
An envelope with a window, and through the window: a check. $50.00, "Pay to the order of Current Resident." It looks bankable for exactly as long as it takes to unfold — then you hit the words printed across it: SPECIMEN–NON-NEGOTIABLE.
Around the fake check, the pitch: "Get your 7 highest-usage days free every month, plus 2 extra free days during the Texas summer months. You'll even get a $50 bonus just for signing up." Cancellation fees covered up to $360. A "True Fit Guarantee." A phone number to call — "Hurry!" — with a promo code and an expiration date.
One more detail, easy to miss, at the bottom of the back panel: a PRESCREEN & OPT-OUT NOTICE. This offer was targeted using your credit report — "based on information in your credit report indicating that you meet certain criteria." The fake check gets the envelope opened. The credit bureaus decided whose mailbox it landed in.
P.O. Box · Dallas, TX
$50.00
Pay to the order of
Current Resident · FIFTY AND 00/100 ································
Bonus offer is payable after verified enrollment. Non-transferable. See full bonus details on back.
Recreated from the mailer. The real one looks just like a check — until you read the overprint.
The receipts
Four promises. Four footnotes.
Front of the mailer on the left, its own fine print on the right. Every quote is verbatim from the piece (DFW edition, offer code DMAJUN616M).
What the front says
“Get a $50 bonus with your Free Pass plan.” A $50.00 check is attached.
What the fine print says
The “check” is printed SPECIMEN–NON-NEGOTIABLE. The real bonus is a Visa® prepaid card, redeemable only by phone, sent “within five weeks after TXU Energy has received payment in full of your first month’s bill.” You have 90 days to redeem or “you will not receive it,” you must “retain the qualifying plan at the time of reward processing,” and it’s “not a gift card or gift certificate.”
Verdict 1/4 Not a check. A conditional rebate with a countdown timer.
What the front says
“Get your 7 highest-usage days free every month, plus 2 extra free days during the Texas summer months.”
What the fine print says
“Free days apply to energy charges and TDU delivery charges per kWh. Other billed charges apply normally.” Base charges and fixed delivery charges continue on free days — and nothing on the mailer says what the energy rate is on the other 23–24 days.
Verdict 2/4 The free days are real. The rate that pays for them is the secret.
What the front says
“Cancellation fees covered — we’ll cover any cancellation fees up to $360, so you can switch with confidence.”
What the fine print says
“Just send us your final bill and we’ll cover the fee up to $360 with a credit on your TXU Energy bill. Subject to approval.” You pay your old provider’s fee in cash today; TXU repays it as a bill credit, later, if approved.
Verdict 3/4 A reimbursement with an approval step, not a waiver.
What the front says
“True Fit Guarantee — if your needs ever change, you can change your plan anytime — for free.”
What the fine print says
“If you switch to another provider, cancellation fees apply.” The free change is to another TXU plan only, and the replacement “must be at least 12 months long and must be at least equal to the length of the plan you’re on.” This footnote also carries the line “Multifamily customers only.”
Verdict 4/4 Anytime, as long as it’s TXU, longer, and you qualify.
The missing price
The number that isn't anywhere
Read the mailer front to back and you will not find a rate. Not the energy charge, not an average price per kWh, not a sample bill. For a document whose entire job is to sell you electricity, the price of the electricity is conspicuously absent — while the mailer promises, in bold, "What you see is what you get."
So we went looking for it. As of August 6, 2026:
- It's not on Power to Choose. The state's official plan database — where providers list plans for comparison shopping — shows exactly one TXU plan for the mailer's Dallas ZIP, and it isn't this one.
- It's not on TXU's own website. We walked TXU's online shop for the same ZIP: ten plans on the shelf, no Free Pass. The closest sibling — a shelf plan called "Live Your Free," with the same free-days engine — shows no rate on its page either. You have to start the checkout to see one.
- The mailer's own path is phone-only. "This bonus is only redeemable by calling." The one place you can buy this plan is a sales call, which is the one place you can't quietly compare it to anything.
Every Texas plan is required to have an Electricity Facts Label — the standardized document that states the real average price at 500, 1,000, and 2,000 kWh. This plan's EFL surely exists. But if you're holding the mailer, you can't read it before you dial. A plan you can't comparison-shop is a plan priced for people who don't compare — and the structure of this offer makes comparing as hard as legally possible.
The math
How "free days" get priced
There's no mystery about the engine — free-usage plans all run on the same one. Your 7 highest-usage days hold roughly a third of your monthly consumption (heavy-usage days are heavy — that's why they're picked). Zero those out and the plan has to recover the cost somewhere. It recovers it in the rate you pay on the other 23 or 24 days.
The last public copy of this plan's own Electricity Facts Label (Oncor area, 2020) — back when the plan could still be found in the open — looked like this: about 19.3¢ per kWh all-in on paid days (15.7¢ energy charge plus per-kWh delivery), a $9.95 monthly base charge, and TXU's own modeling assumption that 33.1% of usage lands on the free days. Run those together and you get the blended average TXU itself published: about 13.9¢ — at a time when plain fixed-rate plans in the same area cost several cents less. The arithmetic reconciles perfectly. The "free" days were fully funded, in advance, by the paid ones.
Rates have moved since then and today's Free Pass EFL may differ — that's exactly why it should be public. But the engine can't change, and it gives you the only question that matters on that sales call:
What is the energy charge on the days that aren't free?
Then divide your everyday plan's rate by 0.67. If their answer is higher, the free days cost you money.
| If a plain everyday plan costs | A 7-free-days plan only wins if its paid-days rate is under |
|---|---|
| 10.0¢/kWh | 14.9¢/kWh |
| 12.0¢/kWh | 17.9¢/kWh |
| 14.0¢/kWh | 20.9¢/kWh |
| 16.0¢/kWh | 23.9¢/kWh |
Break-even arithmetic assuming a third of usage lands on free days (the plan's own historical modeling assumption), before base charges — which make the free-days plan look worse, not better. More free usage than a third shifts the math in the plan's favor; less shifts it against.
One more wrinkle worth naming: you can't know which days were free until the bill arrives. The 7 days are chosen retroactively — your highest-usage days that billing cycle. There is no way to aim at them, no way to verify them in advance, and no way to shop around them. The plan is unfalsifiable until you've already paid.
Could it ever make sense?
In fairness: the more extreme your usage peaks, the better a free-days plan performs. A home whose seven biggest days carry well over a third of the month's usage — a pool pump meeting a heat wave, an EV that fast-charges in bursts — captures more free usage than the model assumes. If that's your home and the paid-days rate clears the table above, this engine can work for you. But you can only know that by reading the EFL against your own usage history — the two documents this sales process keeps farthest from you.
Live rates · updated August 7, 2026
What Dallas–Fort Worth homes can get instead, today.
The cheapest of the 117 live Oncor-area plans we list, priced at 1,000 kWh with TDU delivery and base fees included. No phone call required to see any of it — and where a price leans on a bill credit, we say so on the card.
APGE SimpleSaver 11
APGE SimpleSaver 12
Discount Power Bill Credit Bundle 12
Cirro Energy Bill Bonus 24
Cirro Energy Bill Bonus 12
Rates as of August 7, 2026 — always verify on the EFL before you enroll. See every Dallas plan we list →
The playbook
If this mailer is in your hand right now
- Don't start with the phone call. The call is the plan's home turf — the bonus, the countdown, and the price all live there by design. Gather facts first.
- Ask for the EFL in writing. If you do call, say one sentence: "Email me the Electricity Facts Label before I decide." It's your legal right to see it, and the paid-days energy charge and base charge are on it.
- Run the 0.67 test. Take the everyday rate you can get on a plain fixed plan, divide by 0.67, and compare it to the Free Pass paid-days rate. Higher means the free days cost more than they save.
- Value the $50 honestly. A conditional prepaid card that arrives five-plus weeks in, expires, and requires you to stay enrolled is worth about $4 a month across the contract — noise next to even a 1¢/kWh rate difference.
- Stop the mailers at the source. This was a prescreened credit offer. Five minutes at 1-888-567-8688 (888-5-OPT-OUT) or optoutprescreen.com takes you off the prescreen lists for five years.
And if you like TXU — plenty of people do — at least buy from their public shelf, where the plans have visible prices, or better, compare them against everyone else first. That's the whole game: this offer only works when it's the only one on the table.
Quick answers
TXU Free Pass 12 — your questions, answered
Is the $50 TXU check real?
No. The attached "check" is printed SPECIMEN–NON-NEGOTIABLE — you can’t cash it. Per the mailer’s own fine print, the actual bonus is a Visa prepaid card you can only claim by calling, and only after TXU has received payment in full for your first month’s bill. You must redeem within 90 days and still be on the plan when the reward is processed, and the card itself expires.
Is TXU Free Pass 12 a good deal?
The mailer doesn’t print the plan’s rate, and we could not find the plan on Power to Choose or on TXU’s own online shop, so there is no public price to evaluate. What we can say: for any 7-free-days plan to beat a plain everyday plan, its paid-days rate has to be roughly your everyday rate divided by 0.67. Ask for the paid-days energy charge and the base charge before you enroll, then run that math.
Why did TXU send me a check in the mail?
It’s a prescreened credit offer. The mailer’s PRESCREEN & OPT-OUT NOTICE says the offer is "based on information in your credit report indicating that you meet certain criteria." A fake check gets envelopes opened; the credit-bureau targeting decides whose mailbox it lands in. You can stop prescreened offers at 1-888-567-8688 (888-5-OPT-OUT).
Does TXU Free Pass 12 have a cancellation fee?
Yes — $150 if you cancel after the first 60 days, per the mailer’s fine print ("a minimum term of 12 months and an early cancellation fee of $150"). TXU’s Total Satisfaction Guarantee lets new customers cancel free within 60 days.
Are the 7 free days truly free?
The energy charges and per-kWh delivery charges on those days are genuinely zeroed out. But free-usage plans fund the giveaway through the rate charged on all the other days — historically well above ordinary fixed rates. You also can’t know which days were free until the bill arrives; they’re picked retroactively as your 7 highest-usage days.
Where can I find the TXU Free Pass 12 EFL?
We couldn’t find it published. As of August 6, 2026, the plan does not appear on powertochoose.org (TXU lists one plan there) or in TXU’s own online plan shop for the Dallas ZIP the mailer targeted. The Electricity Facts Label exists — Texas requires one for every plan — but you apparently have to call the sales line to get it. Ask them to email it before you agree to anything.
How this case was built
Everything above comes from three places: the TXU Energy Free Pass direct-mail piece itself (DFW edition, offer code DMAJUN616M, photographed front and back), TXU's own websites (txu.com plan pages and the shopping.txu.com order flow, checked August 6, 2026), and the PUCT's powertochoose.org database (same date). Historical EFL figures are attributed and dated in the text. TXU Energy and Free Pass are trademarks of their owner; quotes are reproduced for consumer education and commentary. ChooseMyPower is independent and doesn't sell TXU plans — providers we do list pay the same flat fee, so no plan can buy a kinder read. If TXU publishes the current Free Pass 12 EFL, we'll gladly add its numbers to this page.
Enri Zhulati
Consumer AdvocateEnri knows the regulations, the fine print, and the tricks some retail electricity providers use. He's spent nearly a decade learning how to spot hidden fees, misleading teaser rates, and contracts that sound good but cost more. He writes the guides that show you what they're hiding — his goal is to help Texans avoid the traps and find plans that actually save money.
Sources
- TXU Energy "Free Pass" direct-mail offer, DFW edition, offer code DMAJUN616M (expires 07/31/2026) — front panel and fine print
- shopping.txu.com plan listings for ZIP 75205, checked August 6, 2026
- powertochoose.org (PUCT) plan database for ZIP 75205, checked August 6, 2026
- TXU Energy Free Pass Electricity Facts Label, Oncor delivery area (2020) — energy charge, base charge, and modeled free-day usage share
- ChooseMyPower — live Texas provider rate data (Oncor area)
Sources are cited for informational purposes. Data may have been updated since publication.
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Every plan we list shows its real cost at your usage before anyone asks for your phone number — TDU charges included, bill credits flagged, EFL one click away.
See today's rates at my usageBack to Gimmick Watch — more case files as the mailers come in.