Millions of households could save more than $300 on their yearly energy bills on average just by swapping to better deals on the market, the consumer watchdog has found.
Falling electricity prices over the 12 months to August saw nearly 5m households and businesses on flat rate plans receiving a 4% cut on average, according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
But almost half of those customers had missed out on savings by sticking to the same plan for two or more years, the ACCC’s energy market report found, and were paying an average annual bill of nearly $2,200.
Only one in four households had swapped plans in the last 12 months and found savings of $317 on average – about a sixth of their bill – to pay less than $1,800 a year.
“If you haven’t changed electricity plans in the past 12 months, chances are you are paying more for your electricity than you need to,” the ACCC commissioner Anna Brakey said.
The report also found 2.6 million customers paying the same or more than regulator-set default offers.
“Take some time this holiday period to have a look on the Energy Made Easy or Victoria Energy Compare websites … [or] simply call [your] retailers to see if they have a better offer available,” Brakey said.
Energy companies are required to tell customers if they are eligible for a cheaper offer, via messages printed on their regular bill every three to four months.
In Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland’s south-east and South Australia, only one in five customers were on their retailer’s best offer, in the months ranging from January to August, the report found.
The cheaper options have arisen as more companies compete to gain customers, with more retailers entering the market than leaving it for the first time since 2021.
Costs of supplying retail electricity rose by about a quarter on average across the national energy market in 2023-24 but were expected to stabilise or fall in 2024-25.
after newsletter promotion
Government rebates, which were not included in the report, pulled energy prices down by a further fifth in the year to September, which along with a 6.3% slide in petrol prices saw inflation fall to its lowest rate in more than three years.
Fuel costs fell in the second half of 2024 across Australia’s capital cities on average, according to the NRMA, with regular unleaded petrol selling for 188.5 cents a litre over 2024, down from 189.7 over 2023.
Perth continued to offer the lowest prices, dropping from 183.8 cents a litre to 181.4, while Canberra overtook Brisbane to become the most expensive at 196.3.
That 13.5 cent gap equates to $426 a year in savings at the bowser for the average Australian family living in Perth instead of Canberra, NRMA analysis found.
The federal government has forecast continued downward pressure on petrol prices, while cheaper energy would drag down rising living costs. Official price data for December will be released in late January, weeks out from the Reserve Bank of Australia’s first interest rate-deciding meeting for 2025.
