Welcome email received from Meridian at ±15:30 on a Friday afternoon. 

Purposeful timing to avoid customer calls ..., hmmm?

MikeFly:

 

@caffynz what does Octopus look like where you are? Night rates pretty good in Wairarapa.

 

Octupus 17.33c/kWh for night.

I pulled together data using one of my recent Flick bills (for 14 days) and usage (per half hour, split into peak/off-peak/weekend/night-time, and adjusted as necessary for plans that didn't separate weekend from weekdays etc.)

Flick was $192.75 total.

On the same power usage (including their daily charge for 14 days): 
Octopus flexi would have been $230.23
Genesis EV $233.30
Meridian flat-rate $206.80 (though just been switched over to this, and my new dashboard tells me I am on track for over $500 for this month at this current rate of usage - over double?).
Meridian EV $265.98
Powershop peak/off peak plan $208.20 (assuming I bought all their special pricing).

I might look at Octopus Flexi because that has a weekend rate as well as a different night rate. Slightly cheaper than Genesis EV.... I'm not sure on going back to Powershop again as I found buying the packs confusing.

It's actually been fun crunching the numbers! :D 

Though, as mentioned earlier, our usage is now different to that bill because I no longer work at home. I'll track our usage over the next week or so, to get accurate pattern and recalculate. 

I’ve had one of my NZ rentals migrated from flick over to meridian and it was surprising how expensive power is becoming. 
With meridians pricing, we’re expecting a $400 pa increase (excluding the $10 monthly credit). Doing a bit of a market scan, there doesn’t appear to be many players cheaper. Electric kiwi appeared to be one of most expensive in comparison with kWh rates starting with a 3 (at that rate, I’d be tempted just to get batteries, solar and a generator)

When I first moved over to Aus, the power pricing here was more expensive but after a number of years, it looks like it’s reversed. Will have another look but isn’t looking that promising. 

mattwnz:

 

Normally with income generation assets like the cook strait cable, a business will  depreciate the assets over time and money then put aside for their replacement. 

 

That's not how depreciation works, nor is it what it is designed for. 

Depreciation is an accounting construct to:

• divide the capital cost over the lifetime of the asset so it can be charged against revenue from that asset thus giving a better view of the profit made by that asset, and
• reduce the value of the asset on the balance sheet over its economic life so that the net assets/equity of the business show a true picture.

As far as paying a for an asset at the beginning you either use cash on hand/bank borrowing, or you can do a specific fund raising activity such as issuing Bonds (debt market) or new Share (share market).

Note that no sensible business will be putting the value of the depreciation expense into a bank account to pay for the replacement for a multitude of reasons.

fastbike:

 

mattwnz:

 

Normally with income generation assets like the cook strait cable, a business will  depreciate the assets over time and money then put aside for their replacement. 

 

 

That's not how depreciation works, nor is it what it is designed for. 

 

Depreciation is an accounting construct to:

 

• divide the capital cost over the lifetime of the asset so it can be charged against revenue from that asset thus giving a better view of the profit made by that asset, and
• reduce the value of the asset on the balance sheet over its economic life so that the net assets/equity of the business show a true picture.

As far as paying a for an asset at the beginning you either use cash on hand/bank borrowing, or you can do a specific fund raising activity such as issuing Bonds (debt market) or new Share (share market).

 

Note that no sensible business will be putting the value of the depreciation expense into a bank account to pay for the replacement for a multitude of reasons.

 

 

 

It's normal for councils though https://oag.parliament.nz/1999/2nd-report/docs/part11.pdf and for private business I'd say it's still advisable to retain funds rather than relying on insurance and loans for replacement, otherwise you may be setting yourself up to be quite fragile and not be pricing for sustainability.

rhy7s:

 

It's normal for councils though https://oag.parliament.nz/1999/2nd-report/docs/part11.pdf and for private business I'd say it's still advisable to retain funds rather than relying on insurance and loans for replacement, otherwise you may be setting yourself up to be quite fragile and not be pricing for sustainability.

 

That's a pretty stupid approach to be honest and reflects failed neo liberal economic models. Councils can borrow at very low interests rates and should be funding capital expenditure from bonds where the term is matched to the expected lifetime of the asset, rather than lumping current rates payers with the upfront costs.

As far as small businesses most that I have been involved do not own their assets outright, preferring the advantages of an operating lease model.

fastbike:

 

mattwnz:

 

Normally with income generation assets like the cook strait cable, a business will  depreciate the assets over time and money then put aside for their replacement. 

 

 

That's not how depreciation works, nor is it what it is designed for. 

 

Depreciation is an accounting construct to:

 

• divide the capital cost over the lifetime of the asset so it can be charged against revenue from that asset thus giving a better view of the profit made by that asset, and
• reduce the value of the asset on the balance sheet over its economic life so that the net assets/equity of the business show a true picture.

As far as paying a for an asset at the beginning you either use cash on hand/bank borrowing, or you can do a specific fund raising activity such as issuing Bonds (debt market) or new Share (share market).

 

Note that no sensible business will be putting the value of the depreciation expense into a bank account to pay for the replacement for a multitude of reasons.

That may not be the way business operates today, but I'm old enough to remember when large firms I worked for had Asset Depreciation Reserve accounts into which provisions for asset replacement were journalled, and from which asset replacements were at least partly funded. It only really worked when inflation was low, so I guess it fell out of favour in the 1980s.

PolicyGuy:

 

That may not be the way business operates today, but I'm old enough to remember when large firms I worked for had Asset Depreciation Reserve accounts into which provisions for asset replacement were journalled, and from which asset replacements were at least partly funded. It only really worked when inflation was low, so I guess it fell out of favour in the 1980s.

 

It changed when governments/large corporates transitioned to accrual accounting in the late 70s/80s , prior to that "jam jar" accounting was a pretty common way to depreciate large assets.

(Also the fact that western currencies were gold pegged limited the growth of M3 money, and hence limited access to finance and borrowing)

PolicyGuy:

 

That may not be the way business operates today, but I'm old enough to remember when large firms I worked for had Asset Depreciation Reserve accounts into which provisions for asset replacement were journalled, and from which asset replacements were at least partly funded. It only really worked when inflation was low, so I guess it fell out of favour in the 1980s.

 

"Provision for Depreciation" as an entry in the balance sheet, as the counter journal entry to the Depreciation expense (P&L), was deducted from historical cost of the asset to reflect the impaired value of the asset. So nothing to do with building up a war chest for replacement etc.

There was no CASH transfers involved, just journal entries. When the purchase for a new/replacement asset was issued there was a cheque from the main account that had to be honoured.

Got moved to Meridian last month from Flick. Wanted to get their EV rates.

They need you to fill out a form and submit it along with a recent bill (even though they should have access to that info). I submitted the form twice now (without the recent bill) and no contact. 

 Tried via facebook/messenger today but they said they cant sort via that channel. The chat link on the website put me in a loop back to the start. 

Not a good start to the relationship. Has anyone got a response from them?

As an aside I left my details for pulse energy to get in touch. Told them my annual usage but they have come back wanting a copy of my latest bill. How can they quote me their best price if they already know what i am paying. Surely they already know the line charges from the address so just should just offer their best rates rather than find out what their competitors are charging. Pushing back but not sure how successful it will be. 

mortonman:

 

Got moved to Meridian last month from Flick. Wanted to get their EV rates.

 

They need you to fill out a form and submit it along with a recent bill (even though they should have access to that info). I submitted the form twice now (without the recent bill) and no contact. 

 

 Tried via facebook/messenger today but they said they cant sort via that channel. The chat link on the website put me in a loop back to the start. 

 

Not a good start to the relationship. Has anyone got a response from them?

 

As an aside I left my details for pulse energy to get in touch. Told them my annual usage but they have come back wanting a copy of my latest bill. How can they quote me their best price if they already know what i am paying. Surely they already know the line charges from the address so just should just offer their best rates rather than find out what their competitors are charging. Pushing back but not sure how successful it will be. 

 

After not hearing anything after a week or so, I called them, and then got the email within 30 mins with their EV rates.

I've worked out (as mentioned earlier here) that for 1 week's power usage it'd have been $5 more on their EV plan (as compared to their standard flat rate plan.

I will be doing another comparison after the school break to see if that's still the case.

mortonman:

 

As an aside I left my details for pulse energy to get in touch. Told them my annual usage but they have come back wanting a copy of my latest bill. How can they quote me their best price if they already know what i am paying. Surely they already know the line charges from the address so just should just offer their best rates rather than find out what their competitors are charging. Pushing back but not sure how successful it will be. 

 

 

 

To their credit pulse emailed me back within 15mins. Only offered me a flat rate at first then gave me the offpeak rates when pushed. Still $500/year more than I was paying with Flick unfortunately 

mortonman:

 

Still $500/year more than I was paying with Flick unfortunately 

 

Yes, I couldn't find any plans/rates comparable to what I was paying with Flick :( 

Has anyone found a power company offering Orion's peak and off peak hours in Christchurch (7am to 11am and 5pm to 9pm Mon to Friday (Peak) and the off peak the rest of the time? 

darkasdes2:

 

Has anyone found a power company offering Orion's peak and off peak hours in Christchurch (7am to 11am and 5pm to 9pm Mon to Friday (Peak) and the off peak the rest of the time? 

 

Octopus.