The Territory’s economic regulator has issued a new industry code to make it easier for ACT households to compare electricity offers and reduce their bills.
Senior Commissioner with the Independent Competition and Regulatory Commission (ICRC), Joe Dimasi said the ICRC’s investigation and Report, Improving the transparency and comparability of retail electricity offers, found many consumers could make worthwhile savings on their electricity bills by switching to a cheaper offer, but experienced difficulties in comparing offers.
Mr Dimasi said under the new Retail Electricity (Transparency and Comparability) Code, retailers would have to calculate and advertise discounts off a benchmark reference price to make it faster and simpler for consumers to compare electricity offers.
“Many ACT households and small businesses are concerned about high electricity bills and want more help to find an offer that will save them money,” Mr Dimasi said.
“Retailers will also have to tell their customers when they might have a better offer and help them choose the offer that’s right for them,” he said.
“Under the new Code, retailers will also have to regularly remind their customers to visit the Australian Government’s Energy Made Easy website to check whether another retailer could have an even better offer available.”
Mr Dimasi said the Code would come into effect on 1 October, the same day that the Territory’s reference price came into effect.
The Senior Commissioner said retailers would have to use this reference price when comparing offers.
“Retailers will have around 12 months to change their billing systems and processes to do bill checks for all their customers and add a message to customer bills to tell them if the retailer has an offer that could save the customer money,” he said.
“Until then, transitional arrangements will require retailers to do a better offer check when a customer contacts them to ask for advice on finding a better offer.”
Mr Dimasi said delaying the full implementation of the better offer check would give retailers the time needed to change their billing systems and processes without incurring large costs, which would be passed onto consumers.
He said the transitional arrangements would ensure that consumers could contact their retailer and ask for a better offer check.
The ICRC’s nine-page Code can be accessed at this PS News link and its 41-page Report at this link.
