Power-prices going up - impossible to compare untransparent offers out there

Forums › Off topic › Power-prices going up - impossible to compare untransparent offers out there

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#2970707 20-Sep-2022 23:59

I didn't find the comparison sites useful.

Spending a few hours building up a spreadsheet was the only way I got the info I wanted.

Ended up with Mercury. My model had Octopus as cira $15/m cheaper, but we decided it wasn't worth the effort of being on a time of use plan for that savings (my model had us time shifting a lot of our use).

jarledb

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#2970709 21-Sep-2022 01:12

Someone in the Tesla owners group shared this Google Spreadsheet that should help with comparing the various plans. I made something similar myself when I was doing the comparisons because I found Powerswitch to be pretty useless.

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mattwnz

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#2970710 21-Sep-2022 01:59

shk292:

Maybe consider unbundling the ISP part? My observation is that the more is bundled, the more complicated the comparison becomes. Presumably, that's one reason providers do bundles.

With direct debit payment in place there's no real benefit to bundling other than any nominal discount you receive.

I recently used powerswitch to compare Contact with other electricity and gas providers and ended up changing to Mercury

Gas deals can be better to bundle, as you can often get better deals with that. I use Frank energy, mainly because their pricing is very simple and not a big power user. I first started with them for just gas, but switched power to them. I looked at Octopus but their on peak rates seemed high, and I didn't want my life to be dictated by when the power was the cheapest. Plus Frank still offer low daily user fixed fee. I think we need to do more to incentivize saving power, not charging low power users higher kW rates, which nearly all providers seem to do including Frank. It is crazy IMO.

mattwnz

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#2970711 21-Sep-2022 02:03

jarledb:

Someone in the Tesla owners group shared this Google Spreadsheet that should help with comparing the various plans. I made something similar myself when I was doing the comparisons because I found Powerswitch to be pretty useless.

I heard on a podcast that they are now charging providers a $50 fee each time someone signs up via their switch website, in order to be listed on it to cover costs of running it. So not sure if they have them all listed anymore to compare them all.. I never found it to be that accurate, partly because power companies are regularly changing prices, and they don't' seem to update the website enough. The problem is that power prices can vary depending on where you live and how much power you use, so it is very difficult to have a comparison website that is accurate. IMO their needs to be a central database run by the government or the relevant authority, which all power companies are connected to, to make it far easier for consumers to compare prices.

Deamo

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#2970784 21-Sep-2022 08:20

Geektastic:

Tail wags dog again....

nah, more like Oliver.. regulator asking industry for permission to do its job & being told to bugger off

Batman

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#2971764 22-Sep-2022 15:24

wow i tried to compare rates of different companies and it's not possible! or at least impossibly difficult!

(Dunedin)

boingoboingo

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#2971786 22-Sep-2022 16:40

Thanks for all your input and tips!

As un update, if anyone follows this and might want to save some time:

I had a bundle deal with Contact Energy. It was a good deal, I was paying 59 for Fibre, and electricity/gas wasn't much more than with anyone else.
I got an e-mail about a price-rise and they didn't want to offer me any deals, so I decided to switch.

For my use-case, looks like I got a decent deal with Mercury (for Gas and Electricity) Bundle for 2 years fixed + 250 NZD bonus (as I suspect prices will keep going up).
For Fibre I went with 2degrees. Same price as it would be with Contact Energy's new price (65 NZD), but with free Amazon Prime for 12 months (96 NZD).

Meh.

Because it's impossible to really compare, I don't know if I got the BEST deal.
But I do know I got a better deal than I had, and maybe that's all that matters.

Lesson: Review your contracts every 2 years and switch, 400 $ are 400 $.

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neb

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#2971787 22-Sep-2022 16:43

Batman:
wow i tried to compare rates of different companies and it's not possible! or at least impossibly difficult!

It is...extraordinarily difficult in many cases, and actually impossible in others. Consider for example just two, Contact's 9-midnight free power deal vs Octopus' three different rates at different times of the day and week, with no daily charge for low users but higher rates, and daily charges but lower rates for standard users. Even with lots of power measurements there's no easy way to compare them because some of Contact's power is free and you can shift things to the free time in some cases but unless you know the individual consumption of every large appliance in the house and can zero out the ones you can shift, it's hard to tell whether that's a better deal than Octopus' multi-rate-zones.

However, just be glad we're not in the US. Their power rating is several orders of magnitude more complex than any other country on earth, requiring highly exotic hardware and programming to keep up. I once had chat with one of their techies about it, it was really fascinating. For example back when storage was spinning rust they only stored accounting data on the outer tracks of hard drives because the data rate from there was higher and it minimised head movement. They also ran into all sorts of physical limits on hardware that even the manufacturers weren't aware existed until their use triggered them, for example SSDs that ran at their advertised rate for about two hours and then dropped to a fraction of that due to things like overflowing the onboard RAM cache because there'd never been a free moment to flush it to nonvolatile storage.

raytaylor

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#2972814 25-Sep-2022 21:35

boingoboingo:

How is this still legal in NZ to offer deals that are so complicated and different that they make it impossible to compare them side-by-side at a glance.

Its not one companies fault that other companies dont offer a similar service or pricing plan.

Nothing stopping you from doing an hour-by-hour comparison (contact gives you the info in the customer portal) to calculate what your electricity cost would be with different types of plans.

Ray Taylor

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Spreadsheet for Comparing Electricity Plans Here

Bee

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#2982874 15-Oct-2022 09:46

Just to add another vote to mercury, low user rates are cheapest for us and the $250 credit is good. Internet is $79 a month and being locked in for 2 years is not a big deal for us.

Previously we were with slingshot, who offered us $100 to stay but also increasing fibre charge to 89 a month.

Doing your best is much more important than being the best.

jonathan18

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#3004289 1-Dec-2022 17:20

So just received notification that Electric Kiwi's prices are going up on 1 Jan:

... We always work to offer the most competitive prices we can, and we have taken a number of steps to ensure that your rates stay as low as possible. We know that inflation is hurting Kiwi families, and we are saddened that our industry is contributing to this.

Price change notice

From 1 January 2023, your rates at XX Palmerston North will change. The average cost increase for customers in your area is 98 cents per day.

A quick calculation indicates the new rates would have meant a 15.5% higher bill for our power over the last five months (an increase of $1.02 a day, so close to their claimed average) - not enormous but it's somewhat a death by 1000 cuts (the last increases were only back on 13 May this year). I've been happy to remain with EK as I do like their model and customer service and I get they're being squeezed, but I guess it may be worth at least running the numbers. Not something I'm looking forward to doing...

Stu

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#3004293 1-Dec-2022 17:30

Also had the email from EK, although ours says "The average cost increase for customers in your area is 123 cents per day".

I guess I'll be running the numbers, yet again.

People often mistake me for an adult because of my age.

Keep calm, and carry on posting.

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billgates

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#3004304 1-Dec-2022 18:54

You can check the new EK rates now on the website as all new customer signups as of today will go on the new rate. Just put your address and it will show you the rates. Existing customer prices are going up from 1st January 2023. The new peak rates are crazy for both standard and low user.

Do whatever you want to do man.

tdgeek

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#3004309 1-Dec-2022 19:19

I posted my EK email on 2 other threads. Im not a spot price expert, but..

1. Inflation is 7% so if they want to pass on circa 7%, ok

2. 1 Jan is high Summer, I would have thought that spot prices would be at an all-time low, and they say the lakes are full, so why are my prices up 13%, 19% and 13%

(Peak, Off peak Shoulder and Off Peak Night)

Rushmere

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#3004312 1-Dec-2022 19:31

I just got the same email.

Mine also says the average cost increase in my area is 98c per day. Based on my actual usage, I've calculated my actual increase will be about $1.23 per day. The total overall increase for me will be about 15.6%.

EK Movemaster was previously the cheapest plan for me, but the Contact Energy Good Nights plan would now save me about $15 per month. It's not a lot, but any saving is good. However, I'm not sure whether Contact have already raised prices, or if there is a rise to come. If it's the latter, then it could end up costing me more if I switch. I think I'll hang on and consider whether to switch next month.

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