In September 2024, we teamed up with CitiPower and United Energy to conduct a survey with a diverse range of residential and small to medium business (SMB) customers.

The goal was to identify:

• key motivators, and barriers that influence customer willingness to modify energy consumption habits
• customer awareness, understanding, and responsiveness to time-of-use energy tariffs, acceptance of network control, preferences on meter upgrading and feedback on overall investments being built into the regulatory proposal.

What customers told us

• Shifting consumption habits: compared to SMB customers, residential customers were more willing to shift their energy usage. For both residential and SMB customers, lowering energy bills was the main motivator to shift, and current activities and upfront costs of energy-efficient products was the main barrier.
• Electrification: half of SMB customers were likely to consider replacing their gas appliances whereas almost a third of residential customers would consider replacing in the near future
• Time of use tariffs: across both residential and SMB customers, about half were familiar with the concept of time-of-use tariffs
• Network control: SMB customers were more likely to allow for network control than residential customers, SMB customers were also more willing to allow the network to manage their electric vehicle charging and smart home devices
• Meter upgrades: over two thirds of residential and SMB customers preferred for metres to be proactively replaced to prevent failures
• Overall investment: around half of both residential and SMB customers felt that the bill impact from the improvements represented value for the service they received.

What’s next

Outcomes from the survey report are being used to refine investments being built into the final 2026-2031 regulatory proposal, due for submission to the Australian Energy Regulator in January 2025.

There will be opportunities to get involved and have your say in 2025. Visit the Powercor Regulatory Reset project page and click +Follow to receive email updates.