Enjoying Powershop
I’ve been with Powershop for around a month now, and I have to say it is a very good experience.
First of all, I just love the fact they are an online company, and deal with me online. If I am late paying the power bill, I get a useful e-mail – not someone turning up to disconnect me.
Powershop have no fixed daily charge – you just buy units of power. That is especially good for someone like me, who doesn’t use a lot of power. I once went three years without turning a heater on 
But what I like most is estmating my power usage, and then being able to buy blocks of power more cheaply.
I just purchased around 20 days worth of power at the Easter price of 16.46c/unit which is good value. It has to be used by 30 June 2009, so you don’t buy too much.
The cost of power goes up in winter, reflecting the spot prizes. But you can buy May to August power in advance at a fixed rate of 22.96c.
And for those who are into sustainability over price, you can choose to spend a little bit more to have power from renewable sources etc, or have trees planted to offset your usage.
So far I can honestly say I have no complaints. I can even log in at anytime and supply my own meter reading, so the estimates don’t get way out of kilter from reality. The website is very easy to use.
I won’t know until a few months have passed, how much money it is saving me, but my ballpark estimates are that the savings will be double digits compared to what I was paying. Consumer says they are going to monitor Powershop and report back how it has gone for one of their staff.
April 15th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
And for those who are into sustainability over price, you can choose to spend a little bit more to have power from renewable sources …
How do they know which electrons are from renewable sources? How can they gurantee that the person who pays extra gets the renewable electrons instead of sending them to someone else?
Has no one noticed that electricity is a renewable resource?
April 15th, 2009 at 12:13 pm
are you taking the piss Jack?
April 15th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
no, dime. Serious question. How can any electricity retailer offer to provide power from sustainable sources to some, but not all, its customers?
April 15th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
Oil is a renewable resource, don’t you know? All that bloody chemistry going on as one tectonic plate is subsumed by another.
April 15th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
so you expect them to run a line from a wind mill to your house?
man id love to hear your kyoto theory lol
April 15th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
I’m intrigued by the PowerShop idea. If they could hook into apartment body corporates who could bulk buy and submeter, THEN you’d get the scales of economy to push this thing. You could, for example, designate power on a progressive consumption tariff, just like the Auckland water supply.
April 15th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Jack is right on the money — what a rort!
What happens if a whole lot of people sign up for “renewable” power deals and they can’t generate enough?
Will they refund the difference between that premium-priced renewable power and the good old-fashioned stuff? Will they even admit that they’ve oversold and under generated?
I bet you a fist-full of money they won’t — they’ll just deliver you electrons from a gas/oil-burning plant and pocket the difference.
What a scam. Where’s the Commerce Commission on that one?
What’s more — isn’t a *huge* percentage of our electricity generated from renewable energy sources anyway (hydro, geothermal, etc)?? If so, what are people paying the extra $$ for?
If anyone actually pays a premium for “green” power through PowerShop it’ll be a triumph of spin/marketing over commonsense.
April 15th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
So we/us pay your line charges. Now I recall reading somewhere a few times lately that the lines, renewal and extension of are the major cost of power lines co’s.
Eco friendly power; aka an oxymoron. Same supplier but different coloured power?EH
April 15th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
I think Meridian got done by the Advertising standards people for their claim of renewable power when they couldn’t guarantee their customers were actually consuming it. it’s one of the problems with a pool system and where consumers are a long why from generation.
I’m not sure I understand the model – it looks to me like Meridian are trying to create some form of hedge. They sell fixed volumes at a fixed price to consumers which they can then cover to manage their price exposure? It’s a pretty complex offer which could appeal to savvy consumers but most aren’t – most are very conservative and don’t want change.
There is also the inherent risk of waste credits if you don’t use your full allocation. That either encourages excessive or unnecessary use, or very small purchases which may not give the financial benefit of larger long term ones. I can see people getting annyed if that happens a couple of times.
I would expect the ‘bargains’ to come outside winter where you can ostensibly sell at a ‘discount’ but keep high margins over the real cost of power which often goes down to 2-4 cpkwh in relatively high demand times. But most consumers are on fixed prices so you get that margin anyway…
Interesting their “no daily charges” – I understand that is an increasing component of bills, which you’d expect as companies try to get more competitive on the energy price and shift more revenue onto less exposed elements.
PS no-one just turned up to disconnect you for not paying. You probably just got a reminder on your next bill or a call. Funny how consumers can use straw men to justify their decisions.
April 15th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Interesting, might give that a go – not always convinced that buying on the spot is more price efficient for an individual than longer-term balanced tariffs?
And good lord, for the people talking about “only delivering green electrons”, a pretty quick visit to the site explains what the “green” power options are – one of either tree-planting offsets for average emmissions OR Meridian’s carbonzero electricity which does the same thing (offset emissions from non-renewable generation). Nothing to do with “electricity only from renewable generation” which is impossible.
April 15th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
Jack, I think the idea is that the money you pay for your power goes to people who make power in a way you like. This is, I think, the same as buying their power in the relevant respects.
April 15th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
gareth
There is no doubt buying spot is better overall, especially if you can manage your peak consumption. Just look at the long term spot price averages vs the metered home cost. Yesterday prices were mostly in the $40 to $70 range. Double that for lines charges and then 20% for retail margin and you are still doing better than 23cpkwh on fixed price. Last year you would have got stung but that wasn’t typical – 3 or 4 years ago the average wholesale price was 3.7cpkwh and in 07 it was 5.1 cpkwh.
But there is risk and most of us want simplicity.
April 15th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
I think I’ve seen this company use Che Guevara in their advertisments for some odd reason.
April 15th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
because they see themselves as revolutionary
April 15th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
>>I think I’ve seen this company use Che Guevara in their advertisments for some odd reason.
>because they see themselves as revolutionary
Maybe they plan on butchering the competition
April 15th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
I’m using it – working well. Would be good if Contact, Mighty River made offerings into the system – then we would have a real market. Would also be good if available outside main centres.
April 15th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
Tho I’m not sure if you look good not making it clear whether the post is related to the ad on the same page David. You might be genuine but perception not good.
[DPF: My disclosure statement covers advertising. I don't deal directly with advertisers. I don't know when they are or are not advertising. I don't even know how much they are spending. Scoop does it all for me, and I just get a statement at the end of the month. I was aware of course Powershop has been advertising, but also made it clear that any review of product would be based on my genuine experience. I decided to swap to Powershop because it looked a better way to do power - there was no obligation to do so.
As Labour advertised on the blog last election, I would never guarantee advertising = endorsement
]
April 15th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
Heh, look at that.
April 15th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
Jeeze bully boy, I thought you so called lefties were blaming the “real market” for the recession, just goes to show ya I guess.
April 15th, 2009 at 7:10 pm
There was a bit of a kerfuffle in the 1970′s when it was revealed that the Tiwai Smelter on occasions consumed more power than Manapouri produced. There was a contractural cap that Tiwai demand was to be within Manapouri’s output and this was met over the long term.
The System Operators in the old NZED cold run the grid in the mose economic manner by allowing this ‘politically incorrect’ situation to occur from time to time.
Some bright spark volunteered to sit at Manapouri and check every electron that came through.
If someone has a ‘green’ tariff, they cannot guarantee that each electron that passes through their appliances was directly derived from a ‘green’ generating source. The overall aim is for ‘green’ tariff demand to be attached to availability and as a matter of integrity, a retailer should not ‘oversell’ a ‘green’ tariff. A retailer should ‘close’ the tariff when this happens and can consider increasing the tariff until supply and demand balances. Just like the ‘Tiwai’ example there will probably be occasions when thermal generation is ‘infillng’ ‘green’ type demand eg dry years, lack of wind, etc.
As far as Powershop is concerned, one hopes they have done their sums properly, or they will go the way of ‘On’ Energy. Unlike ‘On’ they can hedge because they could really ramp up the tariff if hey had to buy any significant amount of high spot price power. Present metering availability means they are reliant on monthly or two monthly readings and the honesty of customers providing correct ‘intermediate’ readings. The contract periods seem too short compared with the time to build, commission and amortise plant.
A future tariff form could be to purchase special electricity shares which have allocations of electricity ‘stapled’ to them. The owner can either use the ‘stapled’ electricity or sell it into the market.
April 15th, 2009 at 7:11 pm
You must have a lot more spare time than the rest of us Trevor. Most of us are too busy trying to make a squillion to pay all the lackeys from your past performance to spend everyday looking at a power account.
April 15th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
sheepers you lot are a critical and cynical bunch! All we’re doing is trying to make a bit of a difference, complete the unfinished business of the electricity reforms – delivering true competition to residential customers.
For a discussion on the elusive green electron check out my blog post at Where does my power come from?. As far as I know, no one is claiming that they can draft electrons like sheep and send them in different directions dependent on their source. What some of our suppliers are doing is making commitments over and above the supply of energy credits, whether this is a commitment to only GENERATE (note, generate and not sell) from renewable sources, or to plant trees, or to buy carbon offsets. If you don’t believe in this, or don’t trust the promise the answer is simple don’t buy these products – that is the real benefit of a shop, you have the choice and power to choose the products that suit you.
April 15th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
peterwn I can pretty much guarantee that your electrons don’t come exclusively from a green source because the mechanism is more like a queue – you poke an electron in at one end of a ‘full’ pipe and the electron at the other end is forced out – crudely speaking. So someone is stealing green electrons – the tasty ones with extra whale blubber.
April 15th, 2009 at 8:56 pm
Viking most look once a month – even u could do that.
April 15th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
The bully boy comes back with a mind boggling reply……much like his parliamentary speeches…personal jibes.
I give you 1 brownie point for attempting a reply though bully boy.
Yes I know bully I am guilty of personal jibes too….but I ain’t an MP who is supposed to be a pillar of the community…oh sorry neither are you, are you? But you are public property, and fair game!
[DPF: Please try and keep comments relevant to the topic of the post]
April 15th, 2009 at 9:04 pm
No use if your on gas though.
Was away for 3 weeks in Feb. The bastards charged me $4 for actual gas usage and $34 for gas line charges. How unfair is that.
Surely line charges should be linked to consumption rather than a fixed charge?
April 16th, 2009 at 7:57 am
DPF – now I am convinced…………………..
Your lack of need for the use of a heater tells me what a cold blooded bastard you really are………………..
April 16th, 2009 at 8:09 am
you think NZ power is expensive – I just had a winter quarter gas and lectric bill of 1000 quid.
April 16th, 2009 at 8:56 pm
DPF… I apologise for straying away from the post at 9.03, but mallard is big and brave now that the wicked witch is gone, where were his kahunas when H1 was the boss?????
I certainly do not recall seeing any comments from him last year, although I certainly stand to be corrected.
Big brave boy now isn’t he.
He is pathetic, and I cannot help but have a go while I can.
I will try in future to restrain my comments….but when the heat rises who knows?
April 17th, 2009 at 6:19 am
Don’t worry expat, sounds like some new nuclear power stations are on the way in the UK.
April 17th, 2009 at 6:48 am
lofty, mallards allowed his view. I think he’s a misguided ex-teacher but he has a good insight into the realms of the left machine.
OECD – just had the ex-power company calling to find out why I left for someone cheaper – duh, you were taking the piss…