Savings as a Service

Welcome to another issue of Savings as a Service, your monthly round-up of savings tips and energy industry news from the Bill Hero team.

This month we’ve been looking into the crystal ball to see some welcome forecasts on long term wholesale energy price declines.

Improving price per kW for solar, is continuing to drive down wholesale energy prices across the board, even for non-solar households, and the long term outlook is for continuing retail price reduction.

While this is a very good thing for energy consumers in principle, it opens a new front in the energy confusopoly.

The point of comparison and switching used to be about mitigating the impact of inevitable price increases—its now more about making sure that you get the benefit of wholesale price decreases right away rather than waiting for your retailer to get around to passing through the savings.

Bill Hero stays on top of this for you by constantly checking every bill to see if there’s a better option in the marketplace for you.

Inevitably, retailers are much faster to offer better prices to new customers. They’re much slower to offer the same benefit to existing customers. That’s what we call the Loyalty Tax.

If your retailer is slow to pass on the benefit, we’ll help you move on to a better priced plan.

Also, this month, a cautionary tale on how switching might still not be enough. The energy industry loves to keep consumers confused, and goes to great lengths to make each customer account as profitable as they can, but they usually stop short of outright mis-selling of plans.

One enterprising energy consumer put this to the test by signing up for a specific plan, only to find that the retailer actually put him onto a different and considerably more expensive plan. See the article below for more: I chose the best deal for my home. That’s not what I got.

Bill Hero eliminates this issue by holding your retailer to account on every single bill, so even if the retailer accidently-on-purpose puts you on a worse priced plan, we’ll spot the discrepancy as soon as they issue the very first bill.

Also this month, some shout-outs to Bill Hero partners—you may not be aware that Bill Hero offers market-leading energy comparison and switching service through partnerships with large and small organisations. If you have access to an audience—large or small—you too can participate as a Bill Hero partner, contact us for more information, or just sign up as an affiliate partner.

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Wholesale price decline is changing the game

After so many years of rising prices, most of us are used to thinking about energy switching in terms of mitigating inevitable price increases.

Today, prices are declining, which means that your retailer is steadily improving the profitability on your account just by standing still—as wholesale prices decrease, if all other things stay the same, their margins will improve automatically.

So the point of energy comparison and switching today is to make sure you get the earliest benefit of the wholesale price decreases, rather than waiting for your retailer to finally get around to passing through those savings.

Bill Hero stays on top of this for you on every bill, so you’ll always know when there’s a better plan available to you.

If solar is now so cheap, why is my power bill still so high?

The wholesale cost of electricity is going down, but this does not guarantee you’ll see savings in your bill, here’s why.

Households could save billions with smarter, more flexible electricity pricing

And there’s much more to come - improved solutions for efficient energy consumption will drive down pricing even further.

I chose the best deal for my home. That’s not what I got

It’s not uncommon that retailers ‘accidentally’ switch you to a less competitive plan than the one you asked for. Bill Hero checks every bill, so you’ll know immediately if something is not right

Vulnerable energy consumers still need help

Shocking rise in energy debt needs urgent government action

ACOSS calls on the Federal Government to urgently provide financial support to people on low incomes in energy hardship made worse by COVID-19 after new data shows a shocking increase in energy debt.

Research into vulnerable energy customers

The Payment Difficulty Framework provides guidelines intended to help support vulnerable energy consumers who experience difficulty in managing and paying their bills. New research into the retail energy consumer experience investigates how well its working in practice.

Energy bills and working at home

At last there’s some respite from endless lock-downs, so working from home is no longer such a necessity, but it looks like at least some of the workforce will be working from home much more in future than they were in the Before Times™, which begs the question who should be paying for those increased energy bills?

Should employers pay for lawyers’ utilities bills?

Trust the lawyers to be on the front foot about whether their employers should subsidise energy bills for work-at-home staff.

Review of the month

Another month, more great reviews. Here’s one of our recent favourites:

Become a Bill Hero partner

Bill Hero actively works with partners to bring our energy comparison experience to as many Australia households as possible. We have some very well known partners, including CHOICE and One Big Switch, but we also work with many other publishers, individual bloggers and content creators, and even with individual subscribers through our Affiliate program and Referral program.

Bill Hero is all about generating genuine, measurable savings for Australian households. You can help your audience save hundreds on their energy bills. The Bill Hero Savings Guarantee means that they just can’t lose, and you’ll be the one that helped them save.

Bill Hero for CHOICE

We’ve been partnering with CHOICE, Australia’s premiere consumer advocacy organisation, since early 2020. We love it when CHOICE includes Bill Hero in their energy industry coverage. Here’s one of their latest energy industry posts.