Entergy New Orleans vs. Entergy Louisiana

By Torriono Kelly, master electrician · New Orleans · September 15, 2026

Most homeowners here never notice they're customers of one of two different companies until something goes wrong — a new service connection, a billing question, or a call that gets bounced around. It comes down entirely to which side of the parish line you're on.

What Entergy actually is

Entergy is the regional electric utility that owns and maintains the power lines, poles, transformers and meters serving most of Louisiana, plus parts of Arkansas, Mississippi and Texas. It's the company between the power plant and your meter — it generates and delivers the electricity, and it owns the wire up to the point where it connects to your house. It does not own or wire anything inside your house, and it's a completely separate business from the electrician who does. When someone here says "the power company," this is who they mean.

What most people don't realize is that "Entergy" isn't one company everywhere it operates. It's a parent brand over several separate, regionally regulated subsidiaries — and in this metro area, which one actually serves you depends on your address.

The short version

Orleans Parish — New Orleans proper and Algiers — is served by Entergy New Orleans. Jefferson Parish — Metairie, Kenner, Gretna, Harahan and the rest of the West Bank and East Bank suburbs — is served by Entergy Louisiana. Same parent company, two separate regulated entities, and which one you're billed by depends on the address, not on which Entergy truck happens to drive by.

Why New Orleans has its own utility in the first place

Entergy New Orleans is regulated directly by the New Orleans City Council rather than the Louisiana Public Service Commission, which oversees Entergy Louisiana and the rest of the state. That's a structure unique to this city — most Louisiana municipalities don't set their own utility rates and policy the way New Orleans does. It's a genuinely local quirk of how the city is set up, not a detail that matters day to day, but it's why the two companies aren't just a naming convention.

What actually changes for you

Almost nothing, for the average homeowner — with two real exceptions:

• Your account. Your bill, your online login at myentergy.com, and any builder or service-connection paperwork reference the specific entity that serves your address.
• New or changed service. When we coordinate a disconnect and reconnect for a panel upgrade, a relocated meter, or tying in a standby generator, we're scheduling that with whichever company actually serves that address. It doesn't change whether the work gets done — it changes who we call to get it scheduled.

What does not change: your rights during an outage, how fast either company is expected to respond, or which number you call to report one.

Same number either way, for an outage

Both companies share the same outage line: 1-800-968-8243 (800-9OUTAGE), and the same text option — text OUT to 36778. You don't need to know which entity you're with to report a downed line or a dark block. That part is genuinely simple.

When it's not Entergy's problem at all

The pattern that actually sends people down the wrong path isn't which Entergy they have — it's assuming Entergy owns a problem that's actually theirs. A whole block losing power together is a utility issue, either company. One house losing power while the neighbors keep theirs, or a service mast a storm pulled off the wall, is usually on your side of the meter and needs a licensed electrician, not a utility truck. We cover that distinction in more detail on our emergency electrician page, including what Entergy will and won't reconnect until it's repaired.