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Changes from 1 January 2022
Electricity rates changed for some of our customers in Victoria from 1 January 2022.
These include,
- All Victorian customers on our Basic Home and Basic Business electricity plan which is the Victorian Default Offer (or VDO) received a rate change notice advising their rates changed from 1 January 2022.
- All Victorian unmetered electricity supply customers changed from 1 January 2022.
Changes from 1 February 2022
- Some Victorian gas customers on legacy and /or non-fixed rates received a rate change notice advising their rates changed from 1 February 2022.
For existing customers
Emails or letters will go out to affected customers during the following periods,
- Mid-December 2021 to let you know if there is a change to your rates from 1 January 2022.
- Mid-January 2022 to let you know if there is a change to your rates from 1 February 2022.
You can also view your new rates on your first bill issued after this date.
For new customers
Our current rates can be found here for residential customers and here for business customers .
You’ll also be able to contact us.
- For residential customers call us on 1800 001 772 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am-8.00pm)
- For business customers call us on 1800 249 630 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am–6.30pm)
The Essential Services Commission (ESC) have released new prices.
If you’re on a Basic Home or Basic Business electricity plan on a:
- Flat rate or a flat rate with controlled load, your rates have changed.
- Standing offer time of use rate. This rate changed to the Victorian Default Offer rate.
If you are on these plans, we sent you an email or letter to let you know about the rate change.
View our new Basic Home and Basic Business rates.
Find out more about the Victorian Default Offer.
In an email or letter to let you know about the rate change.
You can also view your new rates on your first bill issued after the date your rates change.
Gas fees and charges eg: reconnection and disconnection fees changed from 1 February 2022.
The amount your electricity and gas bill will change by will depend on your usage, the energy plan you're on and the distribution area you live in.
When we sent you an email or letter to let you know about the rate change, we provided an estimated cost or saving of the change.
Energy travels through four main stages on its journey from generation to the point where you turn
on a switch. Each stage incurs costs that are passed on to you via your energy bill. It is changes in these four main areas that generally influence energy rate changes. These include:
- Wholesale costs – to purchase electricity and gas from generators and producers
- Network costs – charged by distributors for energy transmission and maintenance of the pipes, poles and wires that delivers your energy
- Retail costs – charged by us for servicing and billing your account
- Other costs – incurred by us to comply with government schemes such as the Renewable Energy Target
To find out more, take a look at our video, ‘How energy gets to you’.
Electricity customers on the Victorian Default Offer rates
The Victorian Default Offer rates are set by the Essential Services Commission (ESC) in Victoria. The ESC reviews the reference price every year on 1 January.
The rates used to calculate your energy bills are made up of both usage rates and supply charges.
- The supply charge is a fixed daily service charge to supply energy to your home or small business
- Usage charges are rates charged for the energy you use. Some tariffs have different usage rates depending on the time of day and day of the week you use energy.
- Demand tariffs or demand charges, are billed based on your highest demand for electricity in kilowatts (kW) during a 30 minute interval. They’ve been designed to encourage less electricity use during peak demand times when there’s more pressure on the grid.
Rates are also known as tariffs. For more information go to our tariff pages.
Typically, we review our rates every year:
- in Victoria rate changes usually occur in January and the Essential Services Commission (ESC) reviews the Victorian Default Offer price every year on 1 January.
- in Queensland, New South Wales, Australian Capital Territory and South Australia they tend to happen in July and the Australian Energy Regulator (AER) reviews the Default Market Offer price every year on 1 July.
There may be occasions where a rate change needs to happen at another time.
You can have important notices, including information about rate changes sent direct to your email inbox. Here’s how:
- Register or log in to My Account
- update your ‘bill delivery preference’ to email, to receive your bills and rate change notices via email
- update your ‘communication preference’ to email, to receive important information about your account via email
When you register for My Account, you’ll also receive alerts about upcoming rate changes once you log in.
Your bill will be split pro-rata:
- all rates and charges before and after the change will be detailed on the bill
- your bill will be calculated with the old rates for any of the billing period before the rate change date
- your bill will be calculated with the new rates for the billing period after the rate change date.
The short answer is yes.
A Regular Pay plan is a convenient way to pay your energy bills. Here’s how it works:
- you arrange to pay an instalment amount each week, fortnight or month
- you continue to receive your bills as usual. They’ll show how well your payments are covering your actual usage and charges
- we check to make sure you’re not paying too much or too little, and get in touch if anything needs to change.
Please contact us as soon as possible, so we can work with you to arrange an extension and/or set up a payment plan.
- visit My Account
- chat with us by clicking on the Need Help? Button at bottom of our home page
- For residential customers call us on 1800 001 772 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am–8.00pm)
- For business customers call us on 1800 249 630 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am–6.30pm)
We’ll be happy to help.
We’re all for helping you find smarter ways to use energy. Just head to our ‘Better Energy’ blog to find tips on how to reduce your energy bills, info on going solar, the latest on battery storage and more.
If you receive a Life Support rebate, the daily rate has moved in line with any overall change in rates for your home electricity bills from the date your rates change.
There's no change to PureEnergy GreenPower.
There will be no changes to solar feed-in tariffs.
There are no changes to rates planned for bulk hot water.
We supply businesses and councils in the Ausnet area in Victoria and Ausgrid area in New South Wales with electricity where a physical meter isn’t available. This is called ‘unmetered supply’. What this does is it powers essential services such as streetlights, telecommunications boxes, bus shelters, traffic lights and security lights for example – which we refer to as ‘devices’.
The unmetered electricity supply to these sites is non-contestable, which means we’re the only electricity retailer that can supply this service in your distribution area.
The unmetered electricity supply changed in Victoria on 1 January 2022. This was due to the Essential Services Commission (ESC) making the decision to change the Victorian Default Offer prices. As unmetered supply devices are charged on a standing offer tariff, we’ve adjusted prices to be consistent with the Victorian Default Offer.
- chat with us by clicking on the Need Help? Button at bottom of our home page
- For residential customers call us on 1800 001 772 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am–8.00pm)
- For business customers call us on 1800 249 630 (Monday to Friday, 8.00am–6.30pm)
We’ll be happy to help.
Outside of these hours?