Consumer NZ's annual electricity satisfaction survey, released today, has revealed the country’s best and worst power companies as rated by New Zealanders.
According to a survey of 1511 New Zealanders, the top performers this year were Powershop (77 per cent) and Electric Kiwi (70 per cent), which customers rated above average for competitive pricing, the consumer advocacy group said in a statement.
“Pricing definitely plays a role in this but it’s actually coming down to, consumers are telling us, good customer service," chief executive Jon Duffy told Breakfast.
Duffy said 90 per cent of Powershop customers had never had a customer service issue that "hasn't been dealt with in the way that they expected".
“The customer service is really what’s shining through for these small players.”
The worst performer was Contact Energy at just 42 per cent — its worst score in the past four years.
The industry average is 52 per cent.
Trustpower was the other big player to score below average for value for money (29%). It was also the lowest rated for competitive pricing (28%) and the lowest equal with value for money (29%). In Consumer NZ’s 2020 survey , it was the lowest-rated retailer with an overall satisfaction score of just 43 per cent.
"The crux of it is customers don’t think they’re getting value for money from either provider," Duffy said.
He said only 29 per cent of Contact customers believed they were getting value for money "so there’s a bit of a fairness thing going on here".
"People are paying what they perceive to be high prices for power and not getting what they think they should in return."
Household power costs remain a major concern for one in four Kiwis, with the survey revealing 18 per cent had trouble paying their monthly power bills in the past year.
It also found that 30 per cent of respondents had complained of long wait times when they tried to contact their provider, and 15 per cent had experienced problems with incorrect bills.
Consumer NZ is calling on households to use its free price comparison website Powerswitch to compare plans and check if they can get a better deal.
“You should shop around regularly. You should check in twice a year and make sure you’re on the best deal.”
Powershop, Electric Kiwi and Flick Electric received Consumer NZ People’s Choice awards, which are awarded to providers that stand out for customer service and meet Consumer NZ’s other criteria.
In a statement, Contact told 1 NEWS, "We are obviously disappointed with the survey findings".
"We know we can always do better. From the survey findings we can see there are 42% of our customers who are ‘very satisfied’, 40% are ‘somewhat satisfied’ and 9% are neutral. We'd love to see more people move up the satisfaction curve over the next 12 months.
"Today’s finding are at odds with other data that we have seen, including our own research and the recent Readers Digest survey where Contact collected the award as the most trusted electricity/gas provider in NZ."
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