Andy Hallett
Policy Advocate – Energy
As you may be aware, one of our statutory duties is to be consumer advocate for domestic and micro-business customers. We have been receiving concerning feedback about the experience of micro-businesses in the electricity and gas markets. This feedback, among other aspects, concerns contracting, price and service levels, and sales processes.
We’ve asked Cornwall Energy to update a review of the non-domestic energy markets that they undertook for energywatch, one of our predecessor organisations, in 2004 (http://bit.ly/rENRtx).
A very important element of this report was its survey of stakeholder views and we are interested in hearing from you if you are a micro-business customer. We’re very keen that the updated review incorporates stakeholders’ opinions on:
- the level of competition in supply to non-domestic customers in general and micro-businesses in particular
- general trading conditions for micro-businesses including terms of contract, pricing and margins and standards of service with particular emphasis on how they differ from the wide non-domestic market and whether they have changed since increased protections for micro-businesses were implemented in 2010 following Ofgem’s 2008 Probe
- issues that may act to inhibit non-domestic consumers, especially microbusinesses, from benefiting from competition in supply and how they might be addressed
- the role of agents, brokers and other third party intermediaries including whether there is a need for them to be specifically regulated in either the micro-business sector and/or the wider non-domestic market
- how competition in supply could develop over the next two years given the proposals arising from Ofgem’s Retail Market Review, the Green Deal and other policy initiatives
We have asked Cornwall Energy to update their analysis as fully as possible, but we are well aware of the commercial sensitivities in this area. To this end, while we would prefer as open a process as possible, we understand that there may be information you may wish to provide us confidentially. We and our advisers will of course respect any information provided to us in this way.
We have asked Cornwall Energy to complete this work to a tight schedule (Friday 10 February 2012) so the findings can be used to inform our work as soon as possible. Cornwall Energy has drafted the a questionnaire (Word 132KB) which you may find helpful when responding.
Should you wish to respond, or have any queries please contact Robert Buckley at Cornwall Energy in the first instance. He is contactable on 07717 471317 or robert@cornwallenergy.com.
Depending on your response, Robert may wish to contact you to pursue further any issues you may raise. Please indicate in your response whether you would be willing to undertake a follow up interview or telephone conversation in late February/early March 2012.
I hope you are able to help us with our analysis and am very grateful for any assistance you can provide.
