When are those time-of-use rates, anyway?

I wonder how much confusion there is regarding ‘time-of-use rates’.  I ask, because of a passage I saw in an article entitled ‘Hudak steers clear of hydro price promises’  (Toronto Star, 15 August 2011).  The passage is:  ‘At the campaign-style stop, Hudak was met by local senior Li Zern who was complaining about her hydro bills.  Despite the fact that peak hydro rates end in the early evening, Zern said she is getting up “between two and three” in the morning to cook and clean to try to keep her electricity bills under control. “They’re going up considering that I’m economizing. I’m getting up in the middle of the night to do my work, even my vacuuming,” Zern, a Conservative party member, told reporters.’

Off-peak rates exist between 7am and 7pm, year-round, and all day on weekends and holidays.  I wonder the extent to which these kinds of reports – the ‘need’ to get up in the middle of the night to do ‘electrical jobs’ – become ‘urban myths’.  If they do, efforts to have an informed discussion about electricity policy may be hindered.