\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Electricity prices will rise, but not as much as some confused Powershop customers believed after they checked out the company\u2019s new app.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Some disgruntled customers took to social media to vent their frustrations, with one person claiming this month\u2019s estimate was double their last energy bill of $550.<\/p>\n
\n
\n\u201cMy current estimates are showing as nearly double last year,\u201d one commenter said, \u201cand so far it\u2019s proving likely true.\u201d
\n
<\/p>\n
Another said their power bill for two people was about $131, and their recent estimate was more than $40 higher than that, while their previous bill had always been under $100.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
One person questioned whether $699.29 was an accurate figure for one month\u2019s worth of power in a three-bedroom home.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Lisa Hannifin, the chief customer officer of Powershop owner Meridian Energy, told the\u00a0Herald\u00a0a new Powershop app has been released and some of the new experiences in it might have created some confusion.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cSome Powershop customers are seeing higher estimates than they expected, and we understand why that\u2019s concerning,\u201d Hannifin said.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re sorry for any distress it may have caused people.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cThe important thing to know is customers haven\u2019t been charged those amounts.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat people are reacting to are forward-looking estimates, not an actual bill, and those estimates can be impacted by many factors.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Hannifin explained the company\u2019s underlying power prices had changed in line with what it told customers as part of price changes in April, with customers seeing a 7.9% increase on average, or $5.90 a week.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
She also told the\u00a0Herald\u00a0more than 40% of that rise came from increased network charges, something she said the company could not control.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know the new app experience looks different and will take some getting used to.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re continuing to improve how clearly this information is explained, with new updates coming every day.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cIf customers are worried, we encourage them to get in touch with our team so we can walk them through what the estimate means for them, and help them with their options.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Electricity prices will rise, but not as much as some confused Powershop customers believed after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":405029,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-405028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405028"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405028\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/405029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}