In August 2014 the Authority conducted a survey of consumers to assess their experiences in the retail electricity market. The survey covers New Zealand, Australia, Texas and the Canadian province of Alberta. 

The research results show that retailer switching is widely promoted and easy to do in New Zealand, but consumer switching activity is largely driven by retailers, not consumers.

The results of the survey have been published.

• Consumer survey results

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On 27 February 2015 the Authority sent affected participants a memo requesting feedback on proposed amendments to the registry’s functionality.

The Authority is requesting feedback on three proposed amendments to the registry’s functionality:

• improve the formatting of the postcode field
• increase the shared ICP identifier field 
• improve the visibility of additional information in level 1 of the metering summary attributes screen. 

Feedback is requested by 5 pm on Tuesday 7 April 2015.

• Further information about the proposed amendments and how to provide feedback

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We have published papers from the 12 February 2015 meeting of the Retail Advisory Group (RAG), and the 19 February 2015 meeting of the Wholesale Advisory Group (WAG).

• RAG papers published
• WAG papers published

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• receive regular briefings and progress updates on the in-flight initiatives
• review upcoming key decisions and major milestones
• discuss and provide feedback on decisions and/or concepts relevant to the RFM programme
• discuss and provide feedback on commercial and/or operational impacts of the programme
• share discussion and feedback on items referred from the RFM Industry Forum.

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The majority of the changes made by the Electricity Industry Participation Code Amendment (Trader Default) 2014 came into force on 28 February 2015. The remainder of the changes do not come into force until August 2015. 

The amendments that came into force on 28 February 2015 are to Parts 1, 11, and 14 of the Code.

• Updated versions
• Code amendment

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The Authority has published its second quarter report against its 2014/15 work programme. The report covers the second quarter of the financial year (1 October 2014 to 31 December 2014).

The work programme report provides information about all key market development, implementation, monitoring, information, education, and compliance projects.

• 2014/2015 work programme report published

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The Authority will run the 2015 What’s My Number information campaign in two phases:

• we will launch phase 1 on 8 March 2015 and it will run for two weeks
• we will launch phase 2 around the start of winter and it will run through to spring.

Campaign advertising will involve various media such as:

• television
• digital (online)
• mobile phones 
• radio
• public relations
• non-digital (e.g. magazines, outdoor advertising).

The Authority will continue to work with its partner Consumer NZ.

As the campaign evolves, the Authority may change the timings and details of the media schedule at its discretion.  

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The Authority approved a settlement between Vector Limited, Transpower New Zealand Limited as the grid owner, Transpower New Zealand Limited as the system operator, and Genesis Energy Limited. The settlement resulted from investigations concerning breaches by Vector Limited and Transpower New Zealand Limited as the grid owner when they failed to coordinate protection settings at Albany, causing a loss of supply. 

• Details of settlement

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Information plays an important part in building market confidence and strength.

To assist interested parties in tracking market development, the Authority publishes NZ electricity hedge contracts as a standard section of its weekly Market Brief.

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