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Dear <<First Name>>,
Electricity prices fell between 2018 and 2019 for many small businesses in New South Wales, South Australia, South East Queensland and Victoria. But not all small businesses are taking advantage of potential cost savings that are available.
Fifteen per cent of SME customers in New South Wales, South Australia, South East Queensland and Victoria were still on standing offers in 2019. A small business that uses a median amount of electricity can save about $424 a year by switching to a market offer, according to the findings of our recent electricity markets report.
How to find a better deal
If you are an AGL, EnergyAustralia or Origin customer, you might save the most by shopping around. We have found that the median effective price paid by market offer customers of the big three together was higher in each region than for other providers, although there will be some differences in results for individual retailers.
Search on government energy comparison websites
You can search for the best offers for your individual circumstances through free government energy comparison services:
- Energy Made Easy is available for energy retail electricity customers in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory
- Victorian customers can use the Victorian Energy Compare website.
You can enter your usage data (for example, by providing your meter data or by uploading an electronic or paper copy of your electricity bill) and compare the annual costs of offers.
Use the default offer to compare retailers
The default market offer (or Victorian default offer if you’re in Victoria) is a useful benchmark for electricity customers to compare offers across the market. Retailers are required to compare the prices of their offers to a reference price set by the government and express the difference in percentage terms. This makes comparing offers across retailers easier.
Get tailored advice on how you can save on energy
There is also the Business Energy Advice Program, which offers free, tailored advice to help eligible small businesses identify opportunities to save on energy costs. It also offers online information that is free for any business to access.
Compare your costs to other businesses
Or you can check our aggregate information about how much small and medium enterprise customers actually paid for electricity, which we analysed using billing data collected from 11 electricity retailers.
Kind regards,
Small Business team
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC)
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