{"id":7447,"date":"2016-09-08T20:40:52","date_gmt":"2016-09-08T11:10:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=7447"},"modified":"2024-01-25T16:57:19","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T07:27:19","slug":"solar-bloggers-head-explodes-looking-for-the-best-electricity-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/solar-bloggers-head-explodes-looking-for-the-best-electricity-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Cheapest Electricity Plans For Solar Owners Revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"ronald's

This is how I felt after spending 2 days trying to work out the best electricity plans for solar owners.<\/p><\/div>\n

I’ve said it before<\/a> and I’ll say it again, electricity bills are confusing.<\/p>\n

If you are one of those rare people who don’t find electricity bills confusing, then I have two things to say to you. Firstly, \u201cGood for you\u201d.<\/p>\n

Secondly, \u201cWhen are you returning to your home planet?\u201d because I find it hard to believe you are human.<\/p>\n

Because they are so confusing, it is very difficult to know which retailer offers the best plan for your household. Especially for people with rooftop solar, as they have the additional complication of accounting for feed-in tariffs.<\/p>\n

—
\nUPDATE: May 21, 2020:<\/strong> Since this article was originally published, SolarQuotes has developed a handy tool that enables solar owners to easily compare electricity plans<\/a> and feed in tariffs.
\n—-<\/p>\n

To help out Australians with solar I have spent a great deal of time comparing electricity plans, a task I hate more than trimming my horse’s hoofnails1<\/a><\/sup>, to determine which deals are the best.<\/p>\n

Electricity Plans Are Meant To Be Confusing<\/h2>\n

Electricity retailer plans are intentionally confusing.<\/p>\n

The reason is straightforward. If you were an electricity retailer and you didn’t have the lowest cost plans, would you want people to be able to easily find that out? In case you are a tad naive, the answer is no.<\/p>\n

If you are the electricity retailer with the lowest cost plan you might benefit from people being able to easily find that out. But there can only be one lowest cost retailer and there are over a dozen retailers in South Australia alone, so good luck getting the rest of the industry to go along with easy to understand electricity plans.<\/p>\n

Online Comparison Tools<\/h2>\n

There are electricity plan comparison tools available online to help people find the best deal for them. Even SolarQuotes has one<\/a>. Ours is of course lovely, but even the best can only make use of information that electricity retailers make available.<\/p>\n

I have had an electricity retailer tell me a plan a comparison tool presented me with did not exist. They blamed the tool, but I’m pretty sure I know who the real tool\u00a0was.<\/p>\n

Electricity Retailers Rely On Human Inertia<\/h2>\n

Because electricity plans are confusing most people just stick to the one they have. A minority chop and change constantly and, quite possibly, randomly.<\/p>\n

I think some people change every time an electricity retailer salesperson turns up at their door. I used to get a lot of them before I started feeding my horse Fruit Tingles to make him foam at the mouth.<\/p>\n

The Average Solar Household<\/h2>\n

In order to compare plans I had to work out what a typical solar household is like. I could have used my own home as an example, but there is no point because I am weird. For a start, there’s just me and my horse and the occasional crowd of children. I have no idea where these children come from. Actually, that may be why I have so many.<\/p>\n

According to the Bureau of Statistics the average Australian household contains 2.6 people<\/a>, 0.001 horses, and 0.1 of a completed Census form. I’ve decided to round this up to three people, simply because most of us come in discrete units and not at all because I blatantly discriminate against partial Australians.<\/p>\n

Feed-in Tariff<\/h2>\n

My example household won’t have one of the high feed-in tariffs<\/a> that was available in the past. If you still have a high feed-in tariff, that’s great, and it probably won’t make a great deal of difference to which plan will be the lowest cost one for you.<\/p>\n

Note some retailers don’t give feed-in tariffs for systems larger than 5 kilowatts or 3.3 kilowatts in some cases. So watch out for that if you have a big one.<\/p>\n

Average Solar System Size<\/h2>\n

Here in Adelaide<\/a> the size of the most commonly installed rooftop solar system is around 5 kilowatts<\/a>. But there are still plenty of smaller systems around, so I am going to assume my example household has a 3 kilowatt<\/a> north facing system and half the electricity it produces is exported. In Adelaide it would produce around 4,500 kilowatt-hours a year.<\/p>\n

Grid Electricity Use<\/h2>\n

My sources<\/a>2<\/a><\/sup> tell me the average 3 person household in Adelaide uses 6,076 kilowatt-hours a year. If they self consume 50% of their solar electricity they will use around 3,826 kilowatt-hours of grid electricity per year.<\/p>\n

Don’t Be Too Worried If Your Home Is Different<\/h2>\n

Your household is probably different from my three person, three kilowatt, 50% self consumption example. But the results I get should still be a good guide to what is the cheapest plan for you. The amount you will have to pay on your bills will vary, but the ranking from lowest cost retailer to most expensive should remain reasonably accurate.<\/p>\n

I Assumed Standard Tariffs<\/h2>\n

Most households with rooftop solar benefit from being on a standard tariff<\/a> rather than a time-of-use or demand tariff. And this makes me glad because it made my job comparing them a lot easier. Some people with rooftop solar may benefit from a time-of-use tariff if their consumption patters are unusual, but most will find a standard tariff to be either as good or better.<\/p>\n

I Compared The Best Plans Available<\/h2>\n

Electricity retailers usually have multiple plans available and so I chose the one with the lowest overall cost for my example household I could find. Often these involve a contract that may be one or two or even three years. I used these because most people are likely to stay where they are over that time and the penalty for breaking a contract is not too extreme. Also, if you do move, it is likely they will let you to transfer your contract to your new address.<\/p>\n

I also included any discounts for direct debit, paying bills on time, and electronic billing. So if direct debits and electronic bills are not your bag, baby<\/a>, you may find you have to pay a little more.<\/p>\n

Retailer Plan ID<\/h2>\n

I used electricity plans from the retailers’ own sites to make the comparisons. I included the plans’ identification numbers so you can quote them if you give them a call. However, that might not work. I’ve called a retailer and given them a plan number and they didn’t know what I was talking about. But after I told them it was off their own site they were able to look it up and help me.<\/p>\n

Crunching The Numbers<\/h2>\n

I’m afraid no matter what the retailers tell you that they charge per kilowatt-hour, or what discounts they give, or how the discounts are applied, it is all basically bullshit. You must sit down and crunch the numbers and work out what you are actually likely to pay over a year.<\/p>\n

I spent two days doing just that. Two days I’ll never get back.<\/p>\n

I have taken into account daily supply charges, the price per kilowatt-hour, what discounts they give, how the discounts are applied, and seasonal and other variations in price, to work out how much each plan will cost my example household per year. I haven’t included these details in the rankings below to spare you from having the deal with them. But if you want some of the nitty gritty details just let me know in the comments. And if you see I’ve made a mistake, please let me know.<\/p>\n

Adelaide Electricity Retailer Plan Rankings<\/h2>\n

I have ranked the electricity retailers for Adelaide below from lowest cost to highest. As you can see, there is one clear winner:<\/p>\n

[wpdtable id=”7528″]<\/p>\n

* While their site told me they provided a feed-in tariff<\/a>, when I called Alinta the person who answered the phone could not tell me if they had one or not. If they don’t, their plan would cost my example household $1,401 a year.<\/p>\n

** Red Energy does not support solar in South Australia and does not offer a feed-in tariff.<\/p>\n

*** On the Powerdirect energy price fact sheet it gives the feed-in tariff as 8 cents, but their site says it is 6.8 cents<\/a>. When I called them to check they confirmed it was 6.8 cents for new customers.<\/p>\n

**** If you call Powerdirect they may give you an 18% discount off your kilowatt-hour charges. But this is not mentioned on their energy price fact sheets and when I called them they could not tell me if I would be able to get the discount, so I did not include it. With the discount the annual total would be around $1,242.<\/p>\n

\"graph

How total bill compares with feed in tariff rate. Notice that a high feed in tariff does not correlate with a lower bill.<\/p><\/div>\n

Simply Energy Takes First Place<\/h2>\n

Simply Energy is the clear winner with an annual cost 15% less than the runner-up. That is very impressive and not what I expected. I thought there would be several retailers vying for the lowest cost position.<\/p>\n

Simply Energy Does Not Have Good Reviews<\/h2>\n

Now you know who the cheapest electricity retailer is, I expect you’ll want to rush to sign up with them. But before you do, I will just let you know that according to the Product Review<\/a> site Simply Energy has 492 reviews with an average rating of 1.4 out of 5. Out of those 492 reviews, 422 are a measly single star.<\/p>\n

Retailer Ratings According To Product Review<\/h2>\n

While Simply Energy does poorly on the Product Review site, the giant retailers AGL and Origin do even worse as they both have a rating of 1.3 out of 5. Here are the scores Product Review gives electricity retailers out of 5:<\/p>\n

\"graph

Electricity Retailer Customer Ratings<\/p><\/div>\n

Product Review does not have ratings for Commander Power & Gas, Sanctuary or Urth Energy.\u00a0 [Update 5th of February 2016: Unfortunately, Urth Energy has gone bust<\/a> and is no longer around<\/em>.]<\/p>\n

Take The Product Review Site Ratings With A Few Grains Of Salt<\/h2>\n

Are AGL and Origin two of the worst electricity retailers in Australia, as their 1.3 rating on Product Review suggests? I don’t think so. Both these companies are enormous and have millions of customers each. The vast bulk are probably satisfied with the service they receive or at least are not upset enough to complain. But out of those millions of customers a small minority get ticked off and write bad reviews.<\/p>\n

But when a much smaller company gets a comparable amount of reviews giving it terrible 1 star ratings, I find that cause for concern.<\/p>\n

I’m not saying don’t use Simply Energy. I’m just saying put some of the money you save to one side to buy a stress ball in case things go pear shaped. But it will probably be okay. After all, we all make mistakes<\/a>. But when you make mistakes the ACCC fines you for<\/a>, it is a bit of a worry.<\/p>\n

Mind you, Simply Energy is not the only one to be dinged by the ACCC. AGL<\/a>, Energy Australia<\/a>, and Origin<\/a> have all paid hefty fines.<\/p>\n

High Feed-In Tariffs Do Not Make For The Lowest Cost Plans<\/h2>\n

There is no real correlation between the feed-in tariff offered and the lowest cost plan for solar households. While Urth Energy\u00a0 [Update 5th February: Urth Energy is no longer around.<\/em>] with its 10 cent feed-in tariff is the second lowest cost plan.\u00a0 Click Energy’s Shine Plus plan with its 12 cent feed-in tariff is the third most expensive. The moral is, you have to look at the whole deal and not just the feed-in tariff if you want to save money.<\/p>\n

My Job Is Done<\/h2>\n

Well, it looks like I’m finished here. You all now know the cheapest electricity plans available in Adelaide. I hope you find the information helpful.<\/p>\n

What’s that? You don’t live in Adelaide? You want me to crunch the numbers for other areas? Do you have any idea how how long that will take me? Are you sure you wouldn’t rather just move to Adelaide instead?<\/p>\n

Oh, all right! I’ll do another location for you. But only Sydney!<\/p>\n

Don’t live in Adelaide or Sydney?<\/h2>\n

If you don’t live in Adelaide or Sydney you\u00a0can use our solar friendly retailer comparison tool<\/a> to do a quick and dirty comparison where you live. It won’t have my superhuman error-checking included – but you can enter your last bill details and get an estimate of which retailer will be cheapest based on the solar feed in and consumption tariffs available.<\/p>\n

Sydney Example Household<\/h2>\n

The average 3 person home in Sydney without gas uses 7,840 kilowatt-hours a year. I will assume my example Sydney home has a 3 kilowatt north facing solar system and self consumes half the approximately 4,100 kilowatt-hours it generates each year. Their grid consumption will be 5,790 kilowatt-hours per year.<\/p>\n

I will only use retail plans for the Endeavour<\/a> network area, which covers the western suburbs, because that’s where the majority of people in Sydney live. Endeavour effectively limits most households to installing rooftop solar with inverters and panel capacity below 5 kilowatts. So despite Sydney people using more electricity and receiving less sunshine than in Adelaide, it seems reasonable to use a three kilowatt system for my example.<\/p>\n

Sydney Electricity Retailer Plan Rankings<\/h2>\n

[wpdtable id=”7538″]<\/p>\n

* You will also have to shell out an additional $99 when you first join Mojo.<\/p>\n

** Log in to Powershop’s site each month and receive an extra discount that will lower the annual cost to $1,358.<\/p>\n

*** The maximum solar system size that can receive a 10 cent feed-in tariff from Sanctuary Energy is 3.3 kilowatts.<\/p>\n

**** When I called Momentum, the person on the phone told me, as far as he was aware, they did not have a feed-in tariff for new solar in NSW.<\/p>\n

\n
\"cart

Sydney results<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

As you can see, Simply Energy comes out on top again as clearly the cheapest overall for my example household. While Urth Energy.\u00a0 [Update 5th February: Urth Energy is no longer around.<\/em>] did quite well, coming in third with its 10 cent feed-in tariff, the Click Energy plan with a 10 cent feed-in tariff came in as the second most expensive.<\/div>\n

So the feed-in tariff you receive indicates nothing about which will be the lowest cost plan for you. When shopping around be sure to look at the total cost of the plans on offer.<\/p>\n

If you don’t want to do the maths yourself, then you can use our solar friendly retailer comparison tool<\/a>. You can enter the details from previous bills and see what those bills would have been with the other retailers. It is not quite as accurate\u00a0as sitting down with a spreadsheet and and a telephone for a couple of days, like I did, but it may save your head from exploding in frustration.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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